V.1',!yF,?S'n,.9.^..5A.'-IFORNIA,  SAN  DIEGO 


3  1822  01957  9978 


DIEGC 


O- 


CZAR  OF  MEXICO 


By  CARLO  DeFORNARO 


j'S 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  SAN  DIEGO 


3  1822  01957  9978 


DIAZ 
Czar  of  Mexico 


AN  ARRAIGNMENT  BY  CARLO  DE  FORNARO 


With  an  Open  Letter  to 

THEODORE    ROOSEVELT 


Second  Edition 

(Revised) 


PTBtiSHED  BV  Carlo  ue  Fornaro 

9  West  45th  Street,  New  York 

1909 


September,   15W9 
New  York 


♦'v 


INDEX. 

1 .  Wamijig 7 

2.  Letter  to  Roosevelt 9 

3.  Porfirio  I,  Czar  of  Mexico 13 

4.  A  Review  of  the  Life  of  Porlirio  Diaz 15 

Period  i 


5.  The  Morgue  of  P.  Diaz 41 

His  Assassinations,    His    Victims. 

The  Massacre  of  Vera  Cruz, 

The  Assassinations  of  General  Ramon 
Corona,  of  General  Garcia  de  la  Cadejui 
and  of  General  Angel  Martinez. 

The  Carnage  of  Orizaba. 

6.  The  System.    A  Political  Mafia.    Its  Results.     59 

Histor)'  of  a  Great  Conspiracy. 

7.  Justice  Under  Diazpotism 79 

Belem— The  Mexican  Bastille.  » 

The  Penitentiary. 

The  Correctional  School. 

The  Department  of  Police  in  Mexico. 

The  Ley  Fuga. 

Quintana  Roo — ^The  Mexican  Siberia. 

S.  The  Press  in  Mexico  .  .    10 1 

9.  Political  Parties    ,. . .  .    ...117 

10.  Porlirio  Diaz    \  .',  . 13 : 

1 1 .  The  Central  American  Question     1 1 45 

12.  The  Future  and  Possibilities  of  Mexi  'o  .  i  ;i 


Of  this  book  the  following  editions  are  going  to  \ 
published : 

Mexico. 

Central  America. 

In  Spanish  for 

South  America. 

Cuba. 

.  Spain. 

United  States. 

In  English  for     England. 

Canada. 

In  French  for 

France. 
Belgium. 

Germany. 

In  German  for     Switzerland. 

.  Austria. 
In  Italian         -l   Italy. 


When  I  open  a  work  on  practical  sociology  relating 
to  a  nation,  without  finding  in  it  stringent  criticism,  since 
there  never  existed  bodies  undeserving  of  censure  in  sonie^ 
organ  or  function,  I  write  down  the  name  of  the  author 
as  dithyrambic  and  fraudulent  and  so  as  not  to  be  caught 
again  I  throw  the  volume  into  the  fire  to  prevent  further 
harm  to  the  soul  of  an  honest  man. 

\V.  Todd,  quoted  by  F.  Bih^nes. 


Digitized  by  tine  Internet  Arciiive 

in  2007  witii  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


http://www.arcliive.org/details/diazczarofmexicoOOforniala 


Warning:. 

This  is  to  testify  that  I,  Carlo  de  Fomarc,  author 
of  this  pamphlet,  do  not  harbour  the  design  of  sub- 
verting the  Mexican  Government,  neither  do  I  belong 
to  any  revolutionary  jimta,  nor  do  I  plan  the  overthrow 
of  Porfirio  Diaz  in  order  to  install  myself  in  his  place ; 
that  I  am  neither  a  "gringo"  nor  a  Mexican  and  there- 
fore cannot  be  inventing  any  sociopolitical,  financial 
and  regenerating  schemes;  that  I  do  not  entertain 
any  grudge  or  ill-will  toward  the  Mexican  Government 
or  any  individual  in  Mexico,  since  during  my  stay  there 
I  was  treated  with  the  utmost  courtesy,  and  even  with 
distinction. 

I  challenge  and  dare  Porfirio  Diaz  to  permit 
the  free  sale  of  tliis  book  in  Mexico:  for  if  the 
accusations  herein  are  baseless,  they  can  easily  be 
laughed  away.  However  Porfirio  Diaz  will  not  laugh, 
but  will  silently  suppress  the  truth,  inasmuch  as  a  gov- 
ernment as  perverse  as  his  own  cloaks  its  doings 
with  the  utmost  secrecy.  I  am  perfectly  aware  of 
the  risks  incurred  by  this  venture,  now  and  in  the 
future,  but  I  gladly  shoulder  all  the  responsibilities, 
hoping  that  in  a  near  day  a  high  minded  philanthropist 
will  be  induced  to  create  "  a  society  for  the  prevention 
of  cruelty  to  Mexicans." 

This  pamphlet  contains  the   truth  and  nothing 
but  the  truth,  so  help  me  God! 
Amen. 


To  Theodore  Roosevelt. 

In  a  letter  addressed  to  James  Creelman,  March  7, 
1908,  thanking  him  for  his  article  on  President  Diaz 
in  Pearson's  Magazine,  you  affirm  that  among  con- 
temporary statesmen  there  is  no  one  greater  than 
President  Diaz,  for  he  has  done  for  his  country  every- 
thing that  a  man  humanly  can  do,  and  that  Mr.  Creel- 
man  has  given  to  the  American  people  the  best  and 
most  life-like  picture  that  is  known  up  to  date  of  this 
great  President. 

Now,  I  challenge  all  three  statements  as  erroneous 
and  imjust,  since  they  are  based  on  information  super- 
ficial, one-sided  and  incomplete.  Mr.  Creelman 's  inter- 
view and  your  letter  of  thanks  to  him,  through  their 
Avide  publicity,  have  done  incalculable  harm,  for  an 
opinion,  even  if  honest  and  sincere,  is  harmful  if  founded 
on  misinformation.  Mr.  Creelman  remained  only  a 
few  weeks  in  Mexico — that  was  superficial ;  his  article 
spoke  through  the  lips  of  President  Diaz — that  was 
onesided;  and  his  knowledge  of  the  conditions,  political 
as  well  as  historical  of  Mexico,  was  incomplete  and 
amateurish,  as  his  article  proves.  It  was  my  good 
fortune  nearly  three  years  ago  to  settle  in  Mexico  City, 
as  one  of  the  founders,  one  of  the  directors  and  Sunday 
Editor  of  "Kl  Diario",  which  is  now  the  first  paper  as 
far  as  prestige  and  a  good  second  as  far  as  circulation 
in  the  whole  Republic  of  Mexico.  In  these  years  I 
had  the  opportunity  to  observe  tlie  development  of 
levcnts  from  our  newspaper  office  like  a  doctor  who 
feels  the  pulse  of  a  patient  and  I  have  watched  the  atti- 
tude of  the  Mexican  Government  as  represented  by 
President  Diaz  as  a  curious  spectator  peeps  behind  the 
scenes  at  tlie  workings  of  a  theatrical  company. 

I  have  taken  the  trouble  in  these  years  to  read 
carefully  and  assiduously  the  histor>'  of  Mexico  be-fore 


President  Diaz's  nse  to  power,  and  also  during  his 
regime,  through  files  of  forgotten  newspapers,  pamph- 
lets, and  directly  through  the  Mexicans,  either  friends 
and  admirers  of  President  Diaz,  or  his  enemies  and 
detractors  and  likewise  through  those  who  were  in- 
different to  his  political  work. 

After  patient  and  mature  reflection  I  have  come 
to  the  following  conclusions :  That  President  Diaz  has 
hot  done  all  that  was  humanly  possible,  but  all  that 
was  inhumanly  possible  for  a  man  to  do. 

That  Mr.  Creelman's  picture  of  President  Diaz  is 
not  the  best  known  representation  of  him,  but  it  is  as 
the  President  likes  to  be  represented:  as  the  creator 
and  saviour  of  modem  Mexico. 

That  in  reality  he  is  only  a  tyrant  and  a  despot  in 
the  fullest  sense  of  the  word,  the  creator  of  a  political 
system  more  cruel,  more  diabolical,  more  profound 
than  Machiavelli  ever  dreamed  of  in  his  "Prince",  more 
subtle  and  insidious  than  IvOyold's  order  of  the 
Jesuits,  more  bloody  and  relentless  than  Abdul  Hamid's 
reign  of  terror  and  asassination ;  more  harmful  and 
perverse  to  Mexico  than  Caligula's  sway  over  Rome. 

President  Diaz  has  never  done  an3'thing  for  the 
Mexican  people  except  in  so  far  as  it  could  help  him 
to  rise  to  power,  to  wealth  and  to  international  prestige. 

He  has  stifled  all  the  patriotic  and  pure  ideals  of 
his  people,  keeping  instead  of  the  substance,  a  form, 
an  appearance  which  is  only  a  mockery  and  an  insult 
to  every  intelligent  person. 

Therefore  I  say  that  he  cannot  and  must  not  be 
called  a  great  statesman,  for  being  essentially  personal, 
his  work  will  logically  die  with  him;  that  to  designate 
him  as  a  great  President  is  to  reverse  all  our  politicaJ 
standards,  for  then  Washington  cannot  be  accoimted 
a  great  President,  and  Lincoln  is  not  the  great- 
est, the  purest,  the  highest  ideal  in  statesmanship  if 
this  man  is  considered  great. 

For  President  Diaz  has  sacrificed  all  the  liberties 
of  the  Mexican  people  to  his  personal  ambition,  ex- 

10 


oepting  those  of  his  henchmen,  courtesans,  favorites 
and  conspirators. 

He  has  throttled  and  choked  the  three  great  bul- 
warks of  any  civilized  nation:  personal  liberty,  the  free- 
dom of  the  press  and  common  justice.  For  almost  a 
generation  President  Diaz  has  kept  up  the  comedy  of  a 
democratic,  liberal,  paternal  and  patriotic  govern- 
ment for  the  benefit  of  the  tmsuspecting  civilized 
nations;  his  press  agents  were  the  foreigners  who  in 
exchange  for  concessions  and  privileges  have  given 
back  flatteries,  lies,  or  silence  pregnant  with  meaning; 
his  henchmen,  at  home  and  abroad,  divided  their  spoils 
among  themselves  like  Pashas,  and  to  the  rest  of  the 
Mexicans  were  given  the  bread  crumbs  from  the 
banquet  table  full  of  meat  and  drink,  and  if  they  growled 
they  were  kicked  into  submission.  Verily  he  has 
fooled  all  the  people  some  of  the  time,  but  he  cannot 
fool  all  the  people  all  the  time. 

If  your  patience  is  as  great  as  your  good-will,  read 
these  notes,  for  they  are  the  result  of  honest  and  con- 
scientious research.  The  writer  of  these  lines  has 
broken  away  from  his  financial  interests  so  as  to  be 
completely  free  to  tell  the  truth. 

The  only  claim  he  makes  for  this  work,  is  that  it 
shall  be  the  first  leaf  in  the  volume  for  the  future  his- 
tory of  modem  Mexico,  which  will  have  to  be  rewritten 
by  free  men. 

Carwj  de  Fornaro, 
National  Arts  Club,  New  York. 


11 


Porfirio  I.  Czar  of  Mexico. 

A  great  man  should  make  great  sacrifices  and 
kill  his  hundred  oxen,  without  knowing  whether 
they  would  be  consumed  by  Gods  and  heroes,  or 
whether  the  flies  would  eat  them. 

Emersok. 

Hero  of  a  thousand  and  one  battles,  the  Prince  of 
Peace,  the  Supennan  of  Oaxaca,  the  Saviour  and 
Maker  of  Modem  Mexico,  the  Cincinnatus  of  La  Nona, 
the  great  Lama  of  Chapultepec,  General  Porfirio  Diaz 
unconstitutional  President  of  Mexico,  now  Emperor  by 
Divine  Right,  your  day  of  reckoning  has  almost  arrived ! 

Then  history  will  judge  his  work  for  good  or  bad, 
not  by  the  assistance  of  his  official  press  agents,  his 
intrigants,  his  parasites  and  lackeys;  not  by  the 
miles  of  railroads  and  telegraphs,  by  the  seaports,  the 
public  buildings  and  asphalt  roads  built  on  his  domain, 
nor  by  the  battles  he  won  or  lost,  or  the  multiple  de- 
corations swarming  on  his  proud  chest,  neither  by  the 
army  or  navy  he  created,  or  the  myriads  of  concessions 
sold  to  the  foreigner,  the  fictitious  prosperity  of  Mexico 
and  the  Peace  of  the  Land,  which  is  only  the  Peace  of 
the  Tomb,  the  Peace  of  Varsovia. 

He  shall  be  judged  by  all  the  liberties  he  has 
torn  one  by  one,  deliberately,  from  the  Mexicans, 
by  the  political  ideals  he  has  crushed  for  the  sake  of  a 
peace  which  is  beneficial  only  to  the  political  mafia  he 
has  created. 

He  shall  be  judged  by  the  Justice  he  has  sand- 
bagged, in  its  stead  to  place  puppets  and  helots  of  his 
own ;  by  the  thousands  of  persons  imprisoned,  rotting 
in  the  most  infamous  of  jails;  by  the  thousands  of  indi- 
viduals murdered  in  cold  blood  without  a  trial  or  even 
a  formal  accusation,  like  cattle  driven  to  slaughter  to 
serve  as  a  repast  to  his  ravenous  ambition ;  he  shall  be 
judged  by  his  eagerness  to  terrorize,  while  despairing 

13 


of  love  and  esteem;  his  perpetual  dread  of  revolt, 
which  proves  that  his  sway  is  only  ephemeral. 

He  shall  come  to  judgment  for  the  butchery'  of 
Vera-Cruz,  for  the  assassinations  of  General  Corona, 
General  Martinez,  and  General  de  la  Cadena,  for  the 
murders  of  all  his  rivals,  big  and  small,  for  the 
"red  day"  in  Orizaba,  for  the  scores  of  newspaper  men 
sacrificed  to  his  Great  Fear,  his  terror  of  Liberty,  of 
Justice  and  a  Scjuare  Deal. 

It  was  a  great  sacrifice,  and  the  holocaust  flamed 
up  to  the  skies  and  the  smoke  and  the  cinders  rose  up 
red  and  grey  in  the  semblance  of  Porfirio  Diaz, 
Hero  of  a  Thousand  and  One  Battles. 

But  history  shall  judge  and  blow  the  great  Shadow 
to  the  four  winds. 


14 


A  Review  of  the  Life  of  Pofirio  Diaz. 

The  whole  Hfe  of  Porfirio  Diaz  can  be  divided  into 
four  distinct  periods.  The  first  period  stretches  from 
his  birth  to  the  age  of  twenty -four,  the  second  begins 
when  he  ran  away  to  join  the  opposition  against  Santa 
Anna,  up  to  1867,  ending  with  the  death  of  Emperor 
MaximiHan;  from  1867  till  1876  was  the  third,  the 
period  of  storm  and  stress  which  ended  by  the  capture 
of  the  presidency.  The  fourth  from  1876  till  1908  is 
the  period  of  his  continuous  power  with  the  exception 
of  the  interregnum  of  General  Gonzalez,  (1880-1884). 

The  First  Period. 

It  is  the  period  of  incubation,  the  budding  of  the 
w4Id  flower,  the  evolution  of  the  disciple  of  divinity  into 
the  student  of  the  law. 

This  "man  of  destiny,"  bom  to  the  humblest  walk 
of  life  in  Oaxaca,  1830,  from  a  Spanish  father  and  an 
Indian  mother,  rose  to  the  highest  power  ever  attained 
in  his  country  along  the  high  road  of  warfare,  revo- 
lution and    anarchy. 

But  his  first  footsteps  were  f)eaceful,  almost  com- 
monplace; he  was  a  good  son,  an  industrious  scholar 
and  an  honest  boy. 

In  the  year  1 846  the  city  of  Oaxaca  had  a  little  war 
scare.  They  expected  the  American  soldiers  who  were 
advancing  to  the  capital  of  Mexico  to  attack  Oaxaca. 
Therefore  all  the  schoolboys  enlisted.  It  was  the 
battalion,  "Peor  es  Nada"  ("Worse  is  Nothing"), 
mentioned  seriously  by  such  a  comical  name  in  the 
local  chronicles.  ( i )  Young  Porfirio  enlisted,  too,  but  un- 
fortunately the  comic  battalion  never  went  to  war. 

There  is  nothing  in  the  first  twenty-four  years  to 
give  an  inkling  of  the  crowded  events  of  his  future  life, 


(1)  p.  Diaz.  XXX.  pag.  80. 

15 


the  almost  unattainable  ambitions  of  his  dreams, 
and  of  all  the  romantic  adventures  worthy  of  a 
dime  novel. 

No  fortune  teller,  no  prophet  foretold  him  any- 
thing and  even  he  himself  has  admitted  that  his  high- 
est ambition  as  a  boy  was  to  be  the  colonel  of  a  regi- 
ment. 

Psychological  students  of  his  life  have  attempted 
to  explain  his  success  by  the  inherited  qualities  of  the 
two  races,  the  Spanish  and  the  Mixtec. 

Atavism  does  not  explain  it,  for  there  are  many 
thousand  boys  with  Mixtec  mothers  and  Spanish  fathers 
who  never  become  anything,  not  even  porters. 

The  explanation  lies  within  himself :  it  is  the  per- 
fect equilibrium  between  the  brain  and  the  will.  It  is 
the  logical  explanation  of  the  successes  of  the  con- 
querors, statesmen  and  leaders  of  men.  With  a  little 
more  intelligence  he  would  have  become  a  successful 
lawyer,  with  a  little  more  imagination  he  might  have 
grown  into  a  militant  journalist  or  a  promoter;  with 
too  much  will  power  he  would  have  ripened  from  a 
revolutionar}'^  leader  into  a  bandit  chief. 

The  Don  Quixote  in  every  man  must  be  evenly 
balanced  by  a  Sancho  Panza  to  insure  a  practical 
success. 

"A  commonplace  being,  attentive  and  prudent 
every  day  of  his  life,  experiences  very  often  the  pleasure 
of  triumphing  over  men  with  imagination,"  savs  Stend- 
hal. 

The  Second  Period. 

This  is  the  quixotic  epoch  of  his  life.  He  was 
battling  for  several  ideals.  He  rebelled  against  the 
despetism  of  Santa  Anna,  against  the  power  of  the 
Church,  the  arbitrariness  of  the  all-powerful  governors, 
the  autocratic  "jefes  politicos",  he  fought  for  the  ideals 
of  Hidalgo  and  Morelos,  and  "Mexico  for  the  Mexicans", 
for  personal  liberty  and  justice,  until  his  desperate 

16 


struggles  and  his  daring  were  acknowledged  by  his 
old  teacher  in  law,  Benito  Juarez.  One  fine  day  (2  Die. 
1854)  Porfirio  ran  away  with  a  bandit  named  Estaban 
Aragon,  because  he  had  refused  to  vote  for  that  arch- 
comedian  and  despot,  Santa  Anna,  and  the  poHce  were 
on  his  tracks.  On  that  fateful  day  he  found  his  true 
vocation.  For  almost  twenty- two  years  he  fought 
almost  unceasingly,  in  the  first  thirteen  years  for  a 
f>olitical  ideal,  in  the  succeeding  nine  years  for  the 
presidency. 

Therefore  was  he  getting  a  practical  lesson  in 
the  art  of  war,  in  the  organization  of  troops  and  cre- 
ation of  revolutions. 

Wlien  still  in  the  midst  of  the  fray  the  War  of  the 
Reform  broke  out.  The  liberal  party  which  he  had  joined 
emerged  victorious  against  the  Church  and  also  lifted 
the  Indian  President,  B.  Juarez,  from  obscurity  into 
the  greatest  personality  in  Mexican  history.  Then 
came  French  intervention.  P.  Diaz  and  the  Hberal 
generals  contended  against  the  disciplined  French 
troops,  by  guerilla  warfare,  in  open  battle,  almost 
naked,  hungry,  poorly  armed,  without  help  from  the 
United  States,  imtil  at  last  they  drove  the  French  into 
the  sea  and  brought  Maximilian  to  the  executioner. 
With  the  Emperor's  death,  the  fate  of  the  Church  was 
sealed. 

The  Third  Period. 

The  young  general  who  had  fought  for  so  many 
political  ideals  was  disappointed  at  the  meagre  recom- 
pense meted  out.  The  thorn  of  envy  began  to  sting 
and  the  patriot  sacrificed  everything  in  his  mad  rush 
for  supreme  power.  It  was  a  tantaHzing  and  im- 
patient struggle  against  the  impassive  and  adamant 
Juarez. 

Once  he  was  caught  and  forced  to  appear  before 
Juarez,  who  said  to  him:  "You  deserve  to  be  shot  Hke 
a  rebel,  but  the  country  takes  into  consideration  the 
services  rendered  by  you  during  the  War  of  Interven- 

17 


tion.  You  are  ver}'-  ambitious  and  you  shall  be  presi- 
dent one  of  these  days,  but  not  while  I  live." 

The  first  manifestation  of  Porfirio  Diaz's  ambition 
for  the  Presidency  became  apparent  in  the  year  1867, 
when  "General  Escobedo  was  laying  siege  to  the  town 
of  Queretaro,  and  there  came  to  him  a  commission 
which  to  proposed  the  formation  of  a  military  party 
whose  leadership  should  be  raffled  off  between  Generals 
Escobedo,  Corona  and  Diaz,  the  one  pointed  out  by  fate 
to  carrv^  the  presidency,  for  it  was  not  equitable,  added 
the  commissioners,  that  Benito  Juarez  should  con- 
tinue to  be  President  and  reap  all  the  benefits  of  the 
triumphs  when  it  was  they  who  had  achieved  them  at 
the  expense  of  their  blood  and  the  peril  of  their  lives. 
General  Escobedo  replied,  saying  that  he  was  a  soldier 
and  not  a  politician,  that  he  had  fought  out  of  patriot- 
ism, not  out  of  ambition  and  that  it  sufficed  that 
the  French  had  testified  that  they  would  never  treat 
with  President  Juarez,  for  him  to  think  him  worthy 
of  the  Presidency  at  the  hour  of  success,  and  that  this 
power  should  be  held  in  the  keeping  of  the  great  patriot 
who  had  occupied  that  post  in  the  sad  hours  of  defec- 
tion and  defeat."  (i) 

This  little  lesson  in  patriotism  and  loyalty  made 
the  conspiracy  fall  through. 

From  1867  and  for  more  than  nine  years  General 
Diaz  plotted,  conspired  against,  and  resisted  the  le- 
gal and  constitutional  Government  of  Mexico  under 
President  Juarez  and  President  Lerdo. 

This  now  Prince  of  Peace-at-any-Price  then  broke 
the  peace  of  the  land  with  his  proclamations,  which 
today  read  like  satirical  pamphlets  against  his  own 
administration. 

He  persistently  antagonized  legal  authority,  and 
started  rebellions  in  the  south,  in  the  east  and  the  west 
and  invasions  from  the  United  States  into  Mexico. 
When  Gen.  Escobedo  went  after  him  at  the  head  of 
the  Government  troops,  Gen.  Diaz  fltmked,  disbanded 


(1)  Rectificaciones  Historicas.  P.  I.  Calderon.  Vol.  1.  pag.  68. 

18 


liis  rebels,  and  ran  back  across  the  American  frontier; 
it  all  ended  exactly  in  the  same  manner  as  the  little  re- 
bellion started  a  few  months  ago  from  the  border  by 
the  Magon  Brothers.  Then  it  was  Diaz  Brothers  &  Co. 

He  failed  repeatedly,  started  anew,  was  caught, 
escaped,  but  madly  he  rushed  on  as  if  bitten  by  the  tar- 
antula of  ambition,  filling  the  whole  country  with 
disorder,  unrest,  anarchy  and  disgust. 

He  was  so  utterly  discredited  that  well-think- 
ing and  serious  people  compared  him  to  the  notorious 
bandit  chief  and  cazique  of  Tepic,  Manuel  Lozada. 

This  remarkable  Indian,  savage  and  cruel,  was  a 
strong  and  interesting  character.  He  had  organized  a 
perfect  dictatorship,  his  police  and  spy  system  were 
perfect  and  he  derived  the  funds  for  his  administra- 
tion from  the  custom  house  of  Tepic,  which  he  con- 
trolled. 

Being  ambitious  he  made  a  plan,  too,  a  Proclama- 
tion, The  liberating  Plan  of  Lozada. 

In  a  very  short  time  he  had  organized  an  army  of 
8000  Indians,  to  capture  first  Guadalajara  and  then  the 
Presidency. 

However,  he  was  defeated  at  the  battle  of  "La 
Mojonera"  by  General  Corona.  The  general  impression 
of  the  moment  was  condensed  in  a  phrase  uttered  by  a 
lawyer  who  was  watching  the  dust  raised  by  the  Indian 
hordes  approaching  to  attack  Guadalajara:  "Nothing 
more  was  wanted, than  a  third  Empire  with  Loz- 
ada I."     (i) 

A  popular  phrase  was  repeated,  "Man  overboard," 
to  ridicule  the  failure  of  General  Diaz  as  a  political 
leader,  when  on  his  way  from  New  Orleans  to  Vera- 
Cruz  (1876)  to  start  the  revolution  of  Tuxtepec,  he 
jumped  overboard  to  save  himself  from  capture  by  the 
government  troops.  This  selfsame  Prince  of  Peace 
who  now  poses  hypocriticallj'^  as  the  Protector  of  the 
Constitution  and  Legality,  then  in  the  face  of  popular 
defeat  in  three  presidential  elections,  persisted  in  sub- 

(1)  p.  Diaz.  XXX.  pag.  19. 

19 


verting  public  order  and  hampering  the  prosperity  of 
his  country  with  his  constant  rebelUons,  only  to  satisfy 
his  personal  ambition  and  insatiable  greed. 

In  1867  Benito  Juarez  received  7,422  votes  for  the 
presidency. 

In  1867,  Porfirio  Diaz  received  2,709  votes  for  the 
presidency. 

In  1 87 1,  B.  Juarez  received  5,837  votes  for  the 
presidency. 

In  1871  P.  Diaz  received  3,555  votes  for  the 
presidency,     (i) 

After  the  death  of  Juarez  there  was  another  elec- 
tion and  he  was  defeated  again.     (1872). 

Lerdo  de  Tejada  received  9,520  votes  for  the 
presidency. 

Porfirio  Diaz  received  604  votes  for  the  presidency. 

(2) 

General  Diaz  was  responsible  for  the  "Motin"  (the 
Mutiny),  the  Plan  of  la  Noria,  the  Plan  of  Tuxtepec,  the 
Plan  of  Palo  Blanco.  This  last  one  resulted  in  the 
overthrow  of  President  Lerdo. 

Under  the  headmg  "Motin"  (Mutiny)  El  Siglo  XIX, 
an  opposition  paper,  printed  this  news : 

"According  to  our  information  the  Plan  consists 
in  assassinating  General  Alatorre  when  coming  out  of 
the  theatre,  to  proclaim  as  President,  General  Porfirio 
Diaz  and  impose  on  the  population  an  enforced  loan  of 
$300,000  under  the  penalty  of  pillage."     (3) 

This  mutiny  failed,  because  an  hour  before  the 
realization  of  the  complot  it  was  denoimced  by  an 
ofl&cer  of  the  same  troop. 

When  the  revolutionists  ostensibly  invited  General 
Diaz  to  lead  another  rebellion  he  answered : 

"I  resign  myself  to  the  sacrifice  of  my  honor  and 
of  my  life,  and  if  success  crowns  our  efforts,  I  shall  be 
able  to  give  new  and  evident  proofs  that  /  do  not  aspire 

(1)  Aurora  y  Ocaso.  C.  Ceballos.  pag.  177. 

(2)  P.  Diaz.  XXX  pag.  14. 

(3)  Aurora  y  Ocaso.  C.  Ceballos.  pag.  38. 

20 


to  the  ostentation  of  Power  and  that  I  prefer  to  it  the  oh- 
sctirity  of  the  Home."     (i) 

This  was  one  of  his  usual,  innumerable  political 
lies,  for  his  personal  ambition  for  power  was  so  keen  and 
terrible  that  General  Luis  Mier  Y.  Teran  synthetized 
admirably  the  moral  state  of  the  Master  of  the  Sword 
in  this  phrase:     "Porfirio  Diaz  or  Death."     (2) 

The  Plan  of  La  Noria  is  so  called  because  it  was 
written  at  the  plantation  of  la  Noria  owned  by  General 
Diaz,  who  signed  this  Plan  November  1871.  It  was 
considered  so  absurd  and  preposterous  that  even  an 
opposition  paper  of  Mexico,  "EL  SIGLO  XIX,"  said 
about  it,  November  16,  1871 : 

"The  Plan  of  la  Noria — this  name  had  been  given 
to  a  circular  recently  read  by  the  Minister  of  the  In- 
terior as  emanating  from  General  Diaz.  We  have 
heard  several  persons  say  that  it  is  an  apocryphal  docu- 
ment and  certainly  the  most  effective  means  of  giving 
weight  to  public  opinion  against  General  Diaz 
and  the  revolution  he  is  heading  was  to  attribute 
to  him  a  plan  so  full  of  political  absurdities  as  the  one 
called  the  plan  of  la  Noria.     (3) 

One  of  the  first  decrees  of  Lerdo  after  his  election 
was  that  of  a  general  amnesty  for  all  the  political 
offenders  under  arms  at  that  time.     (July  27,  1872). 

General  Diaz  considered  this  amnesty  as  degrading 
to  himself  and  his  fellow  revolutionists,  as  he  admitted 
in  a  circular  dated  September  13, 187 2, from  Chihuahua : 

"I  thought  it  opportune  that  the  revolution  should 
accredit  to  the  Government  two  persons  of  confidence 
to  enter  into  frank  negotiations  which  would  result  in 
peace  and  in  the  substitution  of  the  degrading  law 
which  purports  to  call  itself  an  amnesty  for  another 
one  which  should  not  lower  our  military  dignity  and 

(1)  Aurora  y  Ocaao.  C.  Ceballos.  pag.  208. 

(2)  Idem.  i>ag.  287. 

(3)  Rectificactonu  HUtnrica*.  P.  1.  Calderon.  Vol.  1.  pag.  35- 

21 


would  not  confuse  us  with  the  dissidents  in  the  time  of 
the  Intervention,  as  they  have  apparently  tried  to  do. "  ( i ) 

On  this  occasion  the  rebel  chief  was  outwitted  by 
the  President  diplomat,  who  succeeded  in  showing  him 
up  as  a  traitor  to  his  country.  It  was  therefore  natural 
that  peace  loving  people  should  have  shown  their 
contempt  at  the  impatriotic  behavior  of  General  Diaz 
by  defeating  him  at  the  polls  at  the  presidential  elec- 
tion of  1872.  But  a  leopard  cannot  change  its  spots 
and  Porfirio  Diaz  in  spite  of  his  numerous  flatterers 
and  pseudo-admirers  is  the  same  traitor  to  his  coun- 
try now  as  he  was  in  the  nine  years  of  almost  inter- 
mittent insurrection  and  sedition. 

Sooner  or  later  he  has  perjured  himself  against 
the  Constitution,  the  Republic,  the  reform  laws  and 
against  non-reelection ;  he  has  broken  with  the  tenets 
of  his  party,  all  the  liberal  principles  he  has  professed, 
and  all  the  aspirations  of  his  country. 

He  yearned  to  be  a  Washington  and  he  became  a 
Latin-American  Sylla;  he  wanted  to  enforce  a  liberal 
paternalism  and  only  succeeded  in  creating  a  rampant 
Diazpotism.  He  hoped  to  emulate  a  Napoleon  I,  and 
instead  followed  the  footsteps  of  Caesar  Borgia.  He 
expected  to  rule  and  he  only  terrorized.  He  even 
imagined  that  he  could  deceive  history  and  he  only 
fooled  himself. 

In  his  private  conversations  with  strangers  and 
friends  he  wants  to  convince  himself  and  others  that 
he  always  meant  to  be  honest  and  self-sacrificing,  but 
that  circumstances  forced  his  hand  the  wrong  way. 

A  year  ago  at  an  audience  given  by  him  to  the 
President  of  El  Diario  he  said : 

"In  1879,  when  I  declared  that  I  was  opposed  to 
the  reelection  for  the  Presidency,  /  was  sincere,  but  later 
my  friends  begged  me  to  remain  in  power  for  the  good 
of  the  country." 

From  this  we  must  infer,  logically,  that  he  is  not 
sincere  now,  for  the  same  friends  are  begging  him  at 

(1)  p.  Diaz.  XXX.  pag.  21. 

22 


every  fake  re-election,  to  remain  in  power  for  the  good 
of  the  cotintry. 

In  the  year  1 871,  in  the  Plan  of  la  Noria,  the  proc- 
lamation against  the  government  of  Juarez,  the  first 
lines  read: 

To  THE  Mexican  Peopi^e 

"The  indefinite,  forcible  and  violent  re-election  of 
the  federal  executive  has  imperilled  national  in- 
stitutions." 

This  comical  appeal  to  the  Mexican  people  from 
this  incipient  satrap  reminds  one  of  the  other  Mexican 
mandarin  and  traitor,  Santa  Anna,  who  used  to  sign 
all  his  bombastic  proclamations  and  letters:  "Father- 
land and  Liberty!"  In  the  famous  plan  of  Tuxtepec 
reformed  at  Palo  Blanco,  March  21,  1876,  he  proclaimed 
under  his  signature: 

"Article  2.  The  same  law  making  the  President 
and  the  Governors  of  the  States  ineligible  to  the  same 
position  w^ill  be  maintained,  this  being  a  measure  of 
constitutional  reform  which  we  agree  to  sustain  by  all 
the  legal  means  afforded  to  us  by  the  Constitution." 

Again  on  September  16,  1879,  President  P.  Diaz 
made  this  declaration  in  Congress: 

"It  is  not  seasonable  for  the  executive  to  express 
his  opinion  on  this  matter,  but  I  must  solemnly  pro- 
test before  Congress  that  /  shall  never  sanction  a  candi- 
dacy for  re-election,  because  even  if  this  was  not  forbid- 
den by  our  code  /  shall  always  respect  the  principles  from 
which  emanated  the  revolution  initiated  in  Tuxtepec." 

(I) 

Every  four  years  or  so  the  old  fox  Porfirio  passes 
the  word  among  his  sycophants  to  disseminate  the 
rumor  that  the  President  is  going  to  relinquish  his 
power,  that  he  is  tired  and  old  and  that  he  wants  to 
retire  to  private  Hfe. 

Then  crowds  of  his  friends,  the  friends  of  friend- 
ship,   officially   and   unofficially   start   pilgrimages  to 

a)  Dario  Oficial.  16  Sep.  1879.  Mexico. 

23 


Chapultepec  or  to  the  Palace  and  beg  him,  petition  him, 
entreat  him  to  stay  for  another  term,  just  for  the  good 
of  the  country.  And  old  Sly  Boots,  with  tears  of  grati- 
tude in  his  eyes,  sacrifices  himself  because  the  Nation 
wills  it. 

"When  a  ruler  says: 'I  want  to  relinquish  Power, 
but  if  the  nation  demands  more  sacrifices,  I  shall  con- 
tinue to  sacrifice  myself,  this  must  be  interpreted  as 
meaning:  *I  have  not  the  slightest  intention  of  giving 
up  power,  and  those  interested  in  my  not  relinquish- 
ing it  must  take,  even  if  in  a  ridiculous  manner,  the 
name  of  the  Nation,  so  that  this  one  should  appear 
to  entreat  me  not  to  forsake  her. ' 

"This  couplet  has  been  sung  in  every  century,  by 
all  the  ambitious  ones  and  has  been  used  as  a  joke  for 
farces,  comic  operas  and  funny  papers."  (i) 

At  the  approach  of  the  presidential  election  of 
1876,  the  ever-ready  Porfirio  initiated  another  revo- 
lution. 

One  of  the  accusations  of  the  revolutionists  against 
the  Government  was:  "That  public  suffrage  had  been 
converted  into  a  farce,  because  the  President  and  his 
friends  by  every  illegal  means,  put  into  public  places 
those  whom  they  call  "official  candidates"  rejecting  all 
the  independent  citizens."     (2) 

The  revolutionists  did  not  wait  until  the  term  of 
Lerdo  was  over,  which  would  have  been  in  November 
30,  1876. 

General  Diaz  gathered  5000  men  and  was  met  by 
General  Alatorre  with  3000  men  near  the  Hacienda  of 
Tecoac.  The  battle  was  a  draw,  for  both  generals  were 
afraid  of  each  other. 

Luckily  for  General  Diaz  the  day  was  saved  by  the 
timely  arrival  of  General  Gonzalez,  who  rushed  like 
a  whirlwind  against  the  enemy  and  thus  the  battle  of 
Tecoac  was  won. 


(1)  El  Verdadero  Juarez.  F.  Bulaes.  pag.  668. 

(2)  Plan  de  Tuxtepec  reformado  en  Palo  Blanco. 

24 


The  total  number  of  deaths  on  both  sides  was 
ninety-five. 

After  this  rout  President  Lerdo,  instead  of  fighting, 
packed  his  trunks  and  ran  away  to  the  United  States. 

The  only  remnant  of  authority  left  in  Mexico  at 
the  flight  of  thelegal  executive  was  Josd  Maria  Iglesias, 
one  the  triumvirs  of  the  liberal  government  during 
French  Intervention. 

Mr.  Iglesias  was  a  pure,  honest  patriot  of  the  Caton- 
ian  type. 

He  was  the  President  of  the  Supreme  Court  when 
Lerdo  left  and  as  such  he  was  constitutionally  the 
president  ad  interim. 

On  this  subject  the  Plan  of  Tuxtepec  said: 

"Article  60.  The  Executive  Power,  without  any 
attribution  excepting  the  administrative,  shall  be  de- 
posited, while  elections  are  taking  place,  in  the  person 
of  the  President  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Justice  or 
the  person  of  the  magistrate  discharging  this  function." 

Mr.  Iglesias  went  to  Queretaro  with  his  govern- 
ment and  while  there  entered  into  negotiations  with 
General  Diaz.  The  parley  took  place  by  wire  between 
Iglesias  and  Justo  Benitez,  the  representative  of  Diaz. 

Benitez  wired  among  other  things : 

"The  unavoidable  basis  of  all  settlement  must  be 
the  Plan  of  Tuxtepec  reformed  in  Palo  Blanco  as  the 
genuine  expression  of  the  national  will.  Do  you 
accept  it?" 

And  Iglesias  answered:  "There  being  no  vacilla- 
tion on  my  part  on  such  a  capital  point,  I  do  not,  nor 
must  I  accept  the  basis  which  you  qualify  as  unavoidable. 
Everything  which  tends  to  divorce  from  the  Constitu- 
tion of  1857,  shall  be  declined  by  me,  who  am  the  only 
representative  of  legality . "     ( i ) 

One  of  the  conditions  imposed  by  General  Diaz  to 
Mr.  Iglesias  was : 

"That  General  Diaz  should  be  Minister  of  War  in 
the  government  of  the  temporary  President;"  an  unac- 

(1)  La  Question  Presidendal.  J-  M.  Iglesias.  pag.  391. 

25 


ceptable  condition  as  Mr.  J.  M.  Iglesias  had  declared 
in  his  circular  that  neither  he  nor  his  ministers  would 
figure  as  candidates  in  the  elections  to  come,  a  circum- 
stance which  General  Diaz  would  not  admit.  So  that 
the  revolutionary  chief  not  only  recognized  the  tem- 
porary President,  but  likewise  wanted  to  form  part  of 
his  cabinet.  The  recognition  was  made  according  to 
Article  82  of  the  Constitution,  and  in  keeping  with  this 
article  the  pretentions  of  General  Diaz  were  quite  vm- 
precedented.(i) 

This  controversy  on  a  fine  point  of  legality  and 
constitutionality  was  well  played  by  General  Diaz  and 
his  revolutionary  band. 

Nevertheless  it  resembled  too  much  the  argument 
between  the  wolf  and  the  lamb.  As  was  to  be  foreseen, 
negotiations  fell  through  and  the  only  remaining  ves- 
tige of  legality  had  to  flee  for  dear  life  into  the  United 
States. 

With  this  incident  ended  the  nine  years  struggle 
of  Porfirio  Diaz  for  the  capture  of  the  Supreme  Power. 

The  Fourth  Period. 

A  Nation  should  never  be  given  over  to  one 
man,  no  matter  who  the  man  is,  and  whatever 
the  circumstances  may  be. 

Thiers. 

A  "prommciamento"  or  a  proclamation  according 
to  the  talented  Mexican  historian,  C.  Pereyra  is:  "the 
form  which  the  military  organization  took  in  Spain  and 
in  the  colonies;  it  is  the  intervention  of  the  army  in 
public  affairs,  imposing  itself  by  force.  As  the  social 
r6le  of  the  army  is  the  conservation  and  the  defense  of 
the  country,  the  pronunciamento  constitutes  a  crime." 

(2) 

It  was  through  the  pronunciamento  of  Tuxtepec 
that  Porfirio  Diaz  rode  into  power,  and  consequently 
through  a  crime. 

As  Napoleon  Bonaparte  could  keep  his  crowai  only 

(1)  Las  Supuestas  Traiciones  de  Juarez.  F.  I.  Calderon.  pag.  xxxvi. 

(2)  Historia  del  Pueblo  Mexicano.  C.  Peire>Ta.  vol.  2.  pag.  60. 

26 


by  the  force  of  arms,  so  Porfirio  Diaz  held  his  own 
autocratic  power  only  by  a  series  of  political  felonies. 
A  detailed  account  of  all  the  atrocities  committed  by 
his  order  and  by  means  of  his  hired  assassins  would  fill 
three  scores  of  large  sized  volumes.  We  shall,  there- 
fore, speak  only  of  the  most  dastardly  and  character- 
istic malpractices,  so  as  to  exemplify  his  mystifying 
"pacific  rule." 

The  metamorphosis  of  Porfirio  Diaz  from  his  first 
term  up  to  the  present  date  is  as  unexpected  as  the 
evolution  from  an  indifferent  and  despicable  v/orm  into 
a  variegated  and  gorgeous  butterfl)\ 

He  came  into  the  presidency  poor  as  a  church 
mouse  but  cunning  as  Ulysses;  utterly  discredited  and 
at  the  same  time  with  a  wealth  of  hopes  and  Machiavel- 
lian possibilities;  without  any  authority,  albeit  know^- 
ing  he  would  have  a  lifetime  in  practical  politics;  lack- 
ing national  and  international  prestige,  though  prepar- 
ing to  create  it  with  the  help  of  financial  juggleries  and 
artful  self-advertisement;  deficient  in  statesmanship, 
nevertheless  trusting  that  the  country's  wisdom  would 
gravitate  round  his  chair  of  state. 

He  came  into  the  first  term  almost  as  a  suspicious 
character.  To  illustrate  his  fact  he  loves  to  relate 
to  his  friends  how  in  the  beginning  he  could  not  find  a 
self-respecting  merchant  to  honor  his  notes  or  to  lend 
him  money  for  the  expenses  of  his  administration. 

It  happened  frequently  when  he  walked  down  San 
Francisco  street  in  Mexico  City,  that  his  friends  and 
acquaintances  would  hasten  into  a  side  street  or  a  shop 
to  avoid  saluting  him. 

Intuitively  he  guessed  that  to  be  able  to  rule  suc- 
cessfully as  a  despot  it  is  essential  to  follow  Machia- 
velli's  aphorism:  "It  is  not  necessary  for  a  prince  to 
have  all  the  virtues  which  I  have  enumerated,  but 
it  is  indispensable  that  he  appear  to  possess  them."  (i) 

And  so  the  wolf  put  on  a  sheep-skin  and  it  de- 
ceived the  simpletons  as  well  as  the  wiseacres. 

(1)  II  Principe.  N.  MachiaveOi. 

27 


The  following  will  show  the  evolution  of  the  so- 
called  presidental  terms  served  by  President  Diaz : 
From   1876 — 1880 — first  period — Revolutionary  Presi- 
dent. 

**     1 880 — 1884    Interregnum  of  Gen.  Gonzalez. 

"     1884 — 1888    second  period — Protector. 

"     1888 — 1892 — third  period — Consul. 

"     1892 — 1896    fourth  period — Consul  for  life. 

"     1896— 1900    fifth  "     Anointed  Ruler. 

"     1900 — 1904    sixth        "      Imperator. 

"     1904 — 1 9 10    seventh    "     Great  Mogul. 
The  graduation  from  the  Revolutionary  President 
to  a  Great  Mogul  is  quite  startling  to  the  ignoramus  but 
it  is  worth  pondering  over. 

To  reach  the  top  of  the  ascending  scale  necessi- 
tated thirty  years  of  imremitting  work  of  corrosive 
destruction  to  all  the  liberties  of  the  Mexican  people — 
liberties  for  which  they  had  fought  for  over  sixty-five 
years.  It  took  Porfirio  Diaz  just  half  that  time  to 
destroy  these.  It  was  eminently  a  secret  operation, 
the  silent  labor  of  the  termit  gnawing  within  a  log  of 
wood  while  you  are  unaware  of  the  destruction  from 
the  outside.  His  first  term  was  the  cement  foundation 
for  the  building  of  imf)erial  power.  Even  so  he  used 
the  term  of  Gen.  Gonzalez  to  experiment  on  the  result 
of  the  initiatives  of  the  payment  of  the  famous  English 
debt,  the  government  bank  and  the  issue  of  the  new 
five  cent  nickel  coin  into  the  currency. 

Very  deftly  and  with  imerring  knowledge  of  Gon- 
zalez's greed,  he  suggested  these  initiatives  while  Min- 
ister of  Fomento  (Department  of  Agriculttu-e,  Com- 
merce and  Manufactures),  in  his  cabinet. 

The  government  of  Diaz  was  not  leaving  a  red 
penny  in  the  treasury  for  his  successor,  M.  Gonzalez, 
notwithstanding  that  the  income  of  the  nation  in  the 
latter  part  of  1880  showed  a  considerable  increase, 
ascending  to  $22,276,845.00.  (i) 

(1)  El  Geo.  Gonzalez  y  su  gobiemo  en  Mexico.  P.  Quevedo  y  Zubieta.  gpa.  123 

28 


At  the  end  of  his  first  period  in  1879  he  declared 
against  re-election,  not  that  he  was  sincere,  but  simply 
because  his  fellow  revolutionists,  plotters  and  rebel 
generals  who  had  helped  him  would  not  let  him  mono- 
poHze  all  the  power  and  all  the  graft. 

So  they  decided  to  put  up  in  1 880  for  the  presidency 
a  loyal  man  who  would  obey  mandates  of  the  party 
imconditionally.  The  choice  fell  ©n  Gen.  Mier  y 
Teran.  Unfortunately  for  them,  Mier  y  Teran  while 
governor  of  Vera-Cruz  obeyed  only  too  well  the  order 
of  assassination  of  President  Diaz  on  the  famous  25th 
of  June  1879.  (i)  This  dastardly  act  raised  a 
tremendous  storm  of  indignation  against  Diaz's  admin- 
istration. That  settled  the  candidacy  of  Gen.  Mier  y 
Teran.  Thereupon  they  chose  Justo  Benitez,  ex- 
secretary  of  President  Diaz  and  his  adviser  and  Meph- 
istopheles  during  his  revolutionary  period.  But  Diaz 
grew  suspicious  of  the  loyalty  of  Benitez  and  so  they 
picked  out  Gen.  Gonzalez  who,  besides  being  his  "com- 
padre,"  compeer,  was  a  soldier  and  would,  therefore, 
obey  his  orders  implicitly. 

Gen,  Gonzalez  was  one  among  the  innumerable 
rebel  chiefs  w!:o,  since  Mexico  became  independent  of 
Spain,  have  made  a  living  through  the  medium  of 
revolutions.  Without  scruples,  devoid  of  patriotism, 
lacking  the  most  elementary  military  training,  the  only 
talent  of  these  men,  with  few  exceptions,  was  braver)' 
on  the  battlefield.  Their  technical  knowledge  was 
equal  to  that  of  Gen.  Cartaux,  who  wrote  to  the  General 
Assembly  in  Paris  his  plan  for  capturing  Toulon  from 
the  English:  "The  general  of  artillery  will  bombard 
Toulon  for  the  space  of  three  days,  at  the  end  of  which 
I  shall  attack  it  on  three  colunms  and  then  I  shall  take 
it  by  storm."  (2) 

To  these  adventurers  the  presidency  was  symbol- 
ized in  the  National  Palace  (the  residence  of  the  Presi- 


(1)  See  corresponding  page 

(2)  Memoirs  of  Napoleon  I.  De  las  Cosas. 

29 


dent  while  in  office)  as  with  the  Mohammedans,  Mecca  or 
Medina  symbolized  Mohammedanism. 

Their  proclamations  generally  read:  "This  plan 
shall  be  enforced  as  soon  as  the  general  in  chief  of  the 
regenerating  army  shall  occupy  the  National  Palace." 
(i)  Evidently  they  considered  the  nation  and  espec- 
ially the  treasury  their  own  private  property. 

Porfirio  Diaz  was  the  associate  and  crony  of  these 
filibusters,  he  absorbed  their  ways,  their  ambitions  and 
he  succeeded  where  they  had  failed. 

The  administration  of  Gonzalez  made  a  terrible 
raid  on  the  treasury  of  the  nation,  through  the  sales  of 
railroad  concessions,  colonizing  schemes,  the  raising  of 
loans,  the  national  bank,  etc. 

President  Gonzalez  and  his  ring  milked  the 
treasury  dry,  up  to  the  last  day,  when  the  President  as 
a  farewell,  took  away  $9,000.00  from  the  government 
strong  box.  (2) 

Among  the  ministers  of  President  Gonzalez  were 
Ignacio  Mariscal,  Minister  of  Foreign  Relations  and  F. 
Landero  y  Cos,  Minister  of  Finances.  Both  these  men 
were  honesty  personified. 

Gen.  Gonzalez,  with  the  help  of  his  evil  genius 
Ramon  Fernandez  (governor  of  the  Federal  District), 
plotted  to  get  Landero  and  Mariscal  out.  When  the 
nickel  law  came  up  for  discussion  in  Congress,  Gen. 
Gonzalez  sent  orders  to  suppress  the  limitation  for  the 
payment.     The  law  was  framed  by  Landero. 

The  Minister  of  Finances  arrived  in  Congress 
too  late  to  interfere  and  as  he  understood  the 
meaning  of  the  amendment,  he  tendered  his  resigna- 
tion. But  before  leaving  his  portfolio  he  declared  in 
Congress:  "We  have  in  the  treasury  more  than  one 
million  dollars."  (3)To  those  hungry  wolves  this  state- 
ment was  like  a  call  to  plunder  and  pillage. 

In  the  deal  of  the   national  bank  the  Parisian 


(1)  El  Gen.  Gonzalez  y  su  sobiemo  en  Mexico.  F.  Q.  y  Zubieta.  pag.  91.  vol.  1- 

(2)  Idem. 

(3)  Idem.  pag.  225.  vol.  I. 


bankers  spent  $1,000,000.  in  shares  and  $1,500,000.  in 
cash  to  buy  off  the  administration, (i) 

The  loan  for  the  payment  of  the  EngHsh  debt  was 
a  scheme  to  make  twenty  miihon  dollars,  but  (give  the 
devil  his  due)  to  allay  public  indignation  the  profits 
were  lowered  to  two  million  dollars.  This,  added  to 
the  nickel  law  which  flooded  the  whole  country  with 
5  cent  nickels,  almost  brought  about  a  revolution.  For- 
tunately the  presidential  term  was  nearly  over  and 
Porfirio  Diaz  stepped  in  as  the  saviour  and  the  out- 
going Gonzalez  left  in  ignominy  and  shame,  branded 
as  the  i^  ttila-President. 

As  soon  as  Gen.  Diaz  came  into  power  in  his  second 
term  "he  soon  did  not  think  of  anything  else  but  him- 
self, his  idea  being  not  to  let  any  competitors  deprive 
him  again  of  the  presidency.  After  eliminating  all 
competitors  he  erected  himself  as  a  sort  of  a  Providence 
to  the  nation,  legitimated  by  necessity.  The  first 
thought  made  him  mistrustful  and  terrible;  the  second 
thought,  exclusive  and  jealous."  (2) 

To  be  able  to  rid  himself  of  his  rivals  one  by  one, 
it  was  necessary  to  own,  body  and  soul,  the  courts,  the 
justice,  the  police  and  the  army  of  the  nation. 

He  began  therefore  to  substitute  for  the  whole 
Department  of  Justice,  from  the  Minister  of  Justice 
down  to  the  merest  clerk,  his  own  obedient  tools. 
Instead  of  the  independent  Governors  who  were  for- 
merly elected  by  the  will  of  the  people,  he  placed  his 
own  men,  ex-generals,  ex-revolutionary  chiefs,  men 
ambitious  for  the  presidency,  as  a  means  of  enriching 
themselves.  As  Governors  they  had  quite  as  good  a 
chance  of  acquiring  wealth  as  if  they  were  in  the 
presidential  chair  and  with  less  danger  of  attracting 
attention.  As  soon  as  he  had  his  creatures  in  all  the 
important  government  places  as  Governors,  Cabinet 
Ministers,  Senators,  Congressmen,  "  jefes  politicos,"  he 
began  his  assault  upon  the  Constitution ;  he  suppressed 

(1)  Idem.  pag.  30.  vol.  II. 

(2)  Rectificadones  Historicas.  F.  Iglesias  Calderon.  vol.  I.  pan.  39.  40 

31 


the  power  of  the  press,  killed  personal  liberty  by  arbi- 
trary imprisonments  and  slowly  made  away  w^ith  his 
enemies  by  the  aid  of  "  accidents"  and  with  the  help  of 
the  notorious  "ley  fuga"  (rmiaway  law),  (i) 

That  Diaz's  government  is  illegal  is  proved  by  the 
fact  that  the  Washington  cabinet  refused  to  recognize 
it  at  first  because  of  its  revolutionary  origin.  (2)  Onh' 
in  the  year  1S79  did  the  cabinet  in  Washington  for- 
mally recognize  the  Diaz  government  and  despatch  a 
representative  to  Mexico.  (3) 

Porfirio  Diaz  thought,  and  not  without  reason, 
that  possession  is  nine-tenths  of  the  law.  To  be  able 
to  remain  in  power  continuously  it  was  imperative 
to  amend  the  Constitution.  Diaz  did  this  at  the 
end  of  his  second  term:  at  his  bidding  his  parasites  in 
"Congress  amended  the  Constitution  so  as  to  allow  the 
President  two  consecutive  terms."  (4)  This  not  being 
sufficient,  "in  his  third  term.  Congress"  instructed  by  him, 
"solved  the  question  for  all  time  by  aboHshing  every 
limitation  whatsoever."  (5)  After  this  affirmation  of 
power  he  was  practically  Consul  for  life  and  was  at 
liberty  to  do  as  he  pleased. 

Separate  chapters  will  be  dedicated  to  his  assassina- 
tions, to  the  muzzHng  of  the  press  and  to  the  perver- 
sion of  justice  under  his  regime. 

The  much-talked  necessity  of  having  Porfirio  Diaz 
in  power  for  the  sake  of  peace  is  another  fairy  tale 
invented  by  the  president  and  his  retinue  of  courtesans 
to  make  a  virtue  out  of  a  gigantic  political  graft. 
Two  of  the  best  known  writers  and  historians  in  Mexico 
have  discussed  this  argument  in  strong  terms.  Says 
F.  Bulnes:  "Peace  is  not  the  cause  of  the  progress  in 
Mexico;  on  the  contrary,  peace  is  the  consequence  of 
the  progress  in  Mexico."  (6) 


(1)  See  corresponding  page. 

(2)  The  Maker  of  Modern  Mexico.  P.  Diaz.  Mrs.  A.  Tweedie.  pag.  280. 

(3)  Idem.  pag.  283. 

(4)  P.  Diaz.  Mrs.  A.  Tweedie.  pag.  337. 

(5)  Idem  page  339. 

(6)  El  porvpnir  de  las  nadones  Hispano  Americanas.  F.  Bulnes.  pag.  270. 

32 


Mr.  F.  Iglesias  Calderon  quotes:  "Two  political 
personages  whose  admiration  for  and  adhesion  to  Gen. 
Diaz  are  manifest  and  proverbial  have  declared  sin- 
cerely that  the  benefits  which  are  attributed  to  the 
present  government  are  in  reality  due  to  the  anterior 
liberal  governments.  This  is  equivalent  to  commuting 
merit  into  luck,  as  the  simple  lapse  of  time  has  de- 
veloped the  welfare  bom  of  the  liberal  government  of 
Benito  Juarez."  (i) 

The  partisans  and  admirers  of  P.  Diaz  claim  as 
proof  of  their  assertion  the  present  prosperity  of  Mexico. 
That  can  be  easily  refuted. 

The  investment  and  development  of  foreign 
capital  mean  to  Mexico  advancement  and  prosperity, 
since  the  country  is  devoid  of  home  capital.  The 
advancement  of  agriculture,  irrigation  and  immigration 
mean  the  welfare  of  Mexico.  The  present  administra- 
tion is  not  responsible  for  the  initial  investment  of 
capital  in  Mexico;  it  has  never  done  anything  for  the 
development  of  agriculture  or  for  immigration  and  only 
after  thirty  years  of  so-called  prosperity  has  it  begim 
to  give  a  thought  to  irrigation. 

It  goes  without  saying  that  neither  invertion  of 
capital  nor  prosperity  were  possible  in  Mexico  so  long 
as  the  political  power  and  practically  four-fifths  of  the 
land  were  in  the  hands  of  the  Church.  Benito  Juarez 
achieved  this  herculean  task  with  a  courage  and  a  per- 
sistence which  are  admirable.  He  succeeded  in  doing, 
in  the  latter  50 's,  what  Italy  dared  to  do  only  in  the 
70's  and  France  but  lately. 

It  took  some  time  for  Mexico  to  recover  from  the 
effects  of  this  terrible  war  and  from  the  War  of  Inter- 
vention. Precisely  this  same  man,  Porfirio  Diaz,  who 
now  is  held  up  as  indispensable  to  the  prosperity  of 
modem  Mexico,  then,  for  almost  nine  consecutive 
years,  broke  the  peace  of  the  land  and  interfered  with 
the  advancement  of  his  country'  by  his  farcical  regen- 
erating plans  and  criminal  revolutions. 

(1)  Rrcttficacione»  Hirtoricas.  P.  Iglesias  Calderon.  vol.  I.  page  24. 

;i3 


The  first  railroad  line,  from  Mexico  City  to  Vera- 
Cruz,  was  finished  during  Lerdo's  period.  During  the 
term  of  Gonzalez  the  overflow  of  American  capital 
headed  toward  Mexico.  Here  I  merely  quote  from  an 
author  who  wrote  in  1884,  "an  unusual  awakening 
in  the  life  of  the  country  resulted  as  a  first  consequence 
of  the  construction  of  the  railroads — this  irruption  of 
American  money  was  followed  by  the  invasion  of  iron" 
(i),  and  further  "they  are  building  twenty  thousand 
houses  in  Mexico  City  and  the  truth  is  that  never  since 
the  year  of  independence  in  Mexico  up  to  the  time 
when  the  millions  which  came  to  Santa-Anna  in  pay- 
ment for  the  dismemberment  of  the  territory,  and  when 
Maximilian  came  to  Mexico  with  the  money  of  Napoleon 
III,  had  we  seen  in  Mexico  so  much  prosperity  or  such 
attractive  perspective  of  wealth  and  welfare."  (2) 

If  Porfirio  Diaz  is  so  indispensable  now  because  of 
his  probity  and  impartiality,  why  did  he  not  prove  his 
honesty  in  1880  when,  instead  of  leaving  money  in  the 
treasury  he  left  it  drained  to  the  dregs,  notwithstand- 
ing that  "The  national  income  for  1879-80  exceeded 
the  sum  of  $21,000,000."  (3) 

A  year  and  a  half  of  honest  financial  administra- 
tion under  Landero  was  sufficient  to  give  the  nation 
over  a  million  dollars  of  surplus  in  the  national  treasury. 
Gen.  Gonzalez  did  not  make  any  pretence  at  honor- 
able and  philanthropic  government,  for  as  soon  as  the 
honest  minister  of  finances  went  out,  the  razzia  or 
raid,  on  the  treasury  began  in  an  unchecked  and 
shameless  manner. 

On  the  other  hand  Diaz  has  always  kept  up  the 
appearance  of  a  patriotic  and  upright  government 
although  in  his  first  term  he  classed  himself  in  the 
same  category  as  Gen.  Gonzalez  and  his  freebooters. 
Only  after  the  third  term,  and  when  he  was  certain 
that  the  presidency  was  in  his  keeping  for  a  lifetime, 

(1)  El  gobiemo  del  Gen.  Gonzalez  en  Mexico.  F.  Quevedo  y  Zubieta.  page  141. 
vol.  I. 

(2)  Idem  page  143  vol.  I. 

(3)  P.  Diaz.  Mrs.  A.  Tweedie.  page  2g2. 

34 


did  he  get  a  semblance  of  order  in  the  department  of 
finances,  for  then,  he  evidently  expected  to  fill  his 
pockets  and  those  of  his  crew,  at  leisure. 

The  income  as  well  as  the  expenditures  of  the 
nation  increased  with  years:  "During  the  same  year 
(1891)  they  (the  Diaz  administration)  spent  all  the 
income  of  the  federal  rents  which  ascended  to  $37,000, 
000.  by  more  than  $5,000,000."  declared  Matias 
Romero  in  congress.  (1892)  (i) 

Matias  Romero  who  had  been  Mexican  minister  to 
Washington  during  the  French  Intervention  cannot  be 
accused  of  coimivance  with  the  administration,  only 
he  was  not  a  financier  and  he  could  not  juggle  with 
figures  as  could  Jose  Y.  Limantour.  Those  who  suf- 
fered most  in  the  end  were  the  Mexican  people  and  par- 
ticularly so  the  government  employees.  These 
wretched  individuals  were  not  paid  in  cash  for  their 
work  imtil  J.  Y.  Limantour  became  minister  of  finances. 
Instead  of  cash,  the  officeholders  received  "  alcan- 
ces",  a  sort  of  I.  O.  U.'s,  or  notes  payable  on  sight  at 
the  treasury. 

With  some  excuse  or  other  these  notes  were  not 
honored  until  they  were  bought  up  by  a  firm  of  Ger- 
man Jews,  the  Scherers,  who  purchased  them  at  40 
and  50%  ojff  and  as  soon  as  they  presented  them  they 
were  immediately  paid  by  the  Minister  of  Finances. 

But  from  the  beginning.  Gen.  Diaz  was  very  care- 
ful, very  scrupulous  in  paying  his  soldiers  regularly,  as 
he  admitted  in  a  toast  at  the  military  college  in  Chap- 
ultepec:  "The  soldiers  who  fought  with  me  loved  me, 
they  were  ready  to  sacrifice  their  lives  for  my  life; 
what  had  I  done,  to  obtain  this  generous  and  self- 
denying  sacrifice,  that  voluptuous  sacrifice,  to  shed  their 
blood  for  my  blood  ?  This  only :  they  had  all  had  the 
conviction  that  I  had  not  cheated  them  out  of  their 
income."  (2)  : ..;  iJ< -i 

In  this  toast  Gen.  Diaz  practically  confesses  that 

(1)  U  Nacion.  8  Die.  1892. 

(2)  Rectiiicaciones  Historicas.  P.  J.  Calderon.  pag.  71. 

M 


he  owes  the  loyalty  of  his  soldiers,  not  to  the  righteous- 
ness of  his  cause,  but  to  the  fact  that  he  had  paid  them 
regulariy. 

In  his  sixth  term  Porfirio  Diaz,  impatient  and 
weary  of  having  to  repeat  the  comedy  of  re-election 
every  four  years,  had  another  law  enacted  by  the  ever- 
obedient  Congress  to  amend  the  Constitution  to  extend 
the  presidential  term  from  four  to  six  years.  This 
Mexican  Augustus,  as  F.  Bulnes  calls  Gen.  Diaz, 
initiated  another  law  "on  April  24th,  1896,  which 
empowered  the  president  to  turn  over  his  power  to 
whom  he  pleased  and  by  the  vote  of  Congress."  (i) 

After  the  Great  Old  Man  had  finished  patching  up 
the  Constitution  of  1857  it  resembled  the  dress  of  a 
buffoon  harlequin. 

He  has  choked  the  independence  of  the  press, 
and  has  taken  possession  of  Congress  and  of  the  army 
and  navy  (?),  as  the  governors  and  jefes  politicos  are 
his  slaves  and  justice  his  servant,  he  owns  and  directs 
the  most  perfect  political  machine  in  the  world. 

Tammany  Hall,  in  comparison  with  his  machine,  is  a 
pink  tea;  Russian  autocracy  seems  tame  with  the  Douma 
at  its  heels;  Abdul  Hahmid  has  played  his  last  trump 
against  the  Young  Turks;  the  fatalistic  Persians  have 
turned  Fate  against  the  allmighty  Shah;  even  Yoimg 
China  has  achieved  the  seemingly  inconceivable,  of 
injecting  reforms  into  the  Celestial  Dragon!  All  the 
down-trodden  nations  of  this  planet  of  ours  have  given 
the  lie  to  history,  to  eminent  principles,  to  inherited 
privileges,  and  are  slowly,  joyously,  breathing  the  pure 
air  of  liberty.  Mexico  alone,  stands  enslaved  by  the 
tyranny  of  one  genial  hypocrite,  tied  hand  and  foot  to 
the  ambitious  lust  of  this  ex-bandit,  hypnotized  by 
the  shrewdest  of  political  confidence  men. 

After  having  erected  his  power  on  an  estuary  of 
blood,  he  acquired  untold  wealth  with  his  political  influ- 
ence,   commanded   the   flattery   of    his    cotmtrymen, 

(1)  Le  Nadon.  1  Die.  1902. 

36 


and  has  captured  by  stealth  the  admiration  of  foreign 
nations.  As  a  cUmax,  Porfirio  Diaz  would  decree  the 
homage  of  history  to  his  memory. 

Should  he  happen  to  relax  his  hold  on  power  or  die 
like  an  ordinary  mortal,  history  will  rush  in  with  a 
vengeance  and  vomit  forth  the  truth  as  from  a  "  cloaca 
maxima"  to  bury  in  the  historical  Potter's  Field  his 
ridiculous  fame  as  patriot,  statesman  and  general. 


When  it  is  in  the  bands  of  a  power  annually  to 
choose  from  every  million  only  ten  innocent  men,  for  the 
purpose  of  killing  them,  everyone  hves  in  a  state  of  terror. 

F.   BULNES. 


The  Morgue  of  Porfirio  Diaz. 

His  Assassinations  and  His  Victims. 

Nearly  thirty  years  ago  Porfirio  Diaz  perpetrated 
the  infamous  carnage  of  Vera-Cruz,  on  the  25th  of  June 
1879.  The  Veracruzans  and  also  the  Mexicans  have 
never  forgotten  this  date ;  and  with  all  his  pretence  at 
paternalism,  his  lies  and  hypocrisies  Porfirio  Diaz,  like 
a  new  Macbeth,  cannot  cleanse  his  hands  of  the  blood 
and  the  responsibility  of  this  dastardly  crime,  which  will 
brand  him  in  history  as  a  second  Caracalla. 

The  much  vaunted  "pacific  rule"  of  this  paternal 
hangman  has  brought  upon  his  head  the  hatred  and  con- 
tempt of  the  Veracruzans,  who  despise  him  with  all 
their  might. 

Two  years  ago  the  newspapers  printed  the  news  of 
the  execution  of  some  political  prisoners  by  President 
Estrada  Cabrera  of  Guatemala;  they  seemed  to  take  a 
special  delight  in  printing  long  articles  and  editorials 
on  the  subject.  I  heard  several  Mexicans  remark: 
"The  newspapers  are  accusing  Cabrera  of  exactly  the 
same  crimes  which  Porfirio  Diaz  has  committed  on  a 
larger  scale,  not  once  but  continuously  and  up  to  our 
present  day.  This  indignation  against  E.  Cabrera  is  an 
indirect  denunciation  of  the  policy  of  Porfirio  Diaz; 
for  as  we  have  no  free  press  we  express  our  opinion  in 
a  roundabout  fashion." 

I  shall  quote  part  of  a  letter  written  by  a  charming 
Mexican  lady,  in  which  this  person  reflects  the  feelings 
of  most  of  her  intelligent  countrymen  in  reference  to  the 
executions  in  Guatemala : 

"The  public  being  at  present  exasperated  against 
President  Estrada  Cabrera  of  Guatemala  and  sympa- 
thizing so  deeply  with  the  four  brave  ones  who  were 
assassinated  in  so  cowardly  a  manner,  there  comes  to 
my  memory,  the  2$th  of  June  at  Vera-Cruz,  and  I  ask 

41 


myself  if  in  Mexico,  the  perpetrator  of  that  infamy,  did 
not  inspire  the  same  repulsion  as  Estrada  Cabrera,  and 
likewise  I  ask  myself,  for  the  latter,  could  there  be  the 
excuse  of  the  influence  of  a  powerful  example.  Trying 
to  imitate  our  cynic  autocrat,  Cabrera  dazzled  by  the 
wondrous  success  of  his  crimes,  thought  that  maybe 
at  the  end  of  a  few  years,  as  it  has  come  to  pass  here, 
he  would  have  all  the  honours,  all  the  incense  of  a  terres- 
trial divinity,  and  that  imposing  himself  through  terror, 
he  would  attain  as  his  neighbour  to  deification  in  life. 

I  insist  that  in  the  evils  which  oppress  Guatemala 
the  worse  part  is  due  to  the  example  of  our  despot." 

In  the  first  term  of  P.  Diaz  (1876-80)  there  was  a 
great  deal  of  unrest  and  dissatisfaction  in  Mexico ;  Gen. 
Diaz  had  not  kept  his  much  advertised  promises  of  the 
plan  of  Tuxtepec ;  as  a  matter  of  fact  things  were  getting 
worse  than  before ;  it  was  a  case  of  falling  from  the  fry- 
ing pan  into  the  fire. 

The  result  was  a  plot  to  overthrow  the  Diaz  admin- 
istration and  to  put  instead  a  "Restoration"  of  the 
lerdist  power. 

These  leaders  plotted  with  little  skill  and  less  suc- 
cess. At  first  the  government  showed  a  certain  len- 
iency toward  the  conspirators  but  there  came  a  time 
when  they  felt  it  would  be  advisable  to  chastise  and 
terrorize  these  enemies  of  the  government. 

The  police  searched  the  house  of  Don  Felipe  Rob- 
leda  on  the  denimciation  of  one  of  the  conspirators. 
They  found  under  the  rug  of  his  room,  papers  referring 
to  the  conspiracy  and  the  list  of  the  names  of  the 
plotters. 

These  names  were  handed  to  Gen.  Diaz  who  sent 
the  list  of  the  names  to  Gen.  Mier  y  Teran  ordering  him 
to  arrest  the  men  implicated  in  the  plot. 

Gen.  Teran  had  these  men  apprehended,  he  wired 
the  news  to  the  president  who  answered  laconically: 
"Shoot  them  red-handed." 

There  was  no  reference  in  this  telegram  to  a  trial  or 
an  investigation  of  the  guilt  of  these  men,  but  only  a 

42 


peremptory  order  to  kill  on  sight.  Nine  men  were  shot. 
They  were ;  Jaime  Rodriguez,  Dr.  Ramon  Albert  Hern- 
andez, Antonio  P.  Ituarte,  Francisco  Cueto,  Luis 
Alva,  Loenzo  Portilla,  Vicente  Capmany,  J.  A.  Rubal- 
caba  and  Juan  Caro. 

The  head  lines  of  a  paper  of  that  period:  "Juan 
Panadero"  Guadalajara,  1 3th  July  1879,  read  like  those 
of  a  modem  yellow  paper : 

"—A  BACCHANALIA  OF  BLOOD.— MURDERS  COMMITTED 
BY  TERAN.— NINE  ASSASSINATIONS.— EIGHT  WIDOWS.— 
THIRTY-SEVEN  ORPHANS.— HORRIBLE  DETAILS." 

Vera-Cruz.    Jtme  29th,  1879. 
A  notice  of  the  editors  says : 

— "In  this  (correspondence  from  Vera-Cruz)  you 
will  see  to  what  a  point  has  reached  the  savagery  of  the 
actual  usurper  of  the  power  and  the  profound  contempt 
in  which  they  hold  the  life  of  man  and  of  individual 
guarantees  when  it  is  a  question  of  the  constitutional- 
ists .  From  this  day  on  Tuxte pecan  and  assassin  will  mean 
the  same  thing  if  Porfirio  Diaz  protects  the  execu- 
tioners of  Vera-Cruz  and  leaves  this  unwarranted  pro- 
ceeding impimished." 

I  merely  quote  from  the  same  paper  a  few  examples 
of  the  manner  in  which  the  order  of  the  president  was 
executed : 

"As  soon  as  Teran  arrived  at  the  barracks  he 
identified  the  person  of  Capmany  and  said  to  him: 

"Are  you  D.  Vicente  Capmany?" 

"Yes,"  answered  the  mariner  frankly. 

"Well,  I  am  going  to  shoot  you  by  order  of  the 
president." 

"You  are  going  to  commit  a  murder,"  answered 
Capmany  "for  there  is  no  reason  for  this,  and  my  con- 
science does  not  accuse  me  of  any  crime." 

"Shut  up!  See  here.  Shoot  this  man!"  ex- 
exclaimed  Teran. 

43 


"Sir,  may  I  write  some  letters  before  I  die?  I 
only  ask  ten  minutes." 

"Shoot  him  on  the  spot,"  shouted  Teran,  lust- 
ing for  blood. 

Teran  left  barracks  No.  23  and  went  over  to  No. 
25.  He  called  in  Rubalcaba  and  Caro,  officers  there  on 
platoon,  and  Loredo  and  Rosello  officers  of  the  same 
barracks  and  took  them  to  barracks  No.  23. 

There  he  gave  orders  to  shoot  all  four  without 
more  ado  or  any  pretense  at  trial.  The  last  one  (Caro) 
having  been  loosely  bound  with  ropes  started  to  run  and 
the  soldiers  fired  on  him,  killing  one  soldier  on  guard 
and  wounding  two  more. 

The  hyena  called  in  A.  Ituarte,  a  young  man  28  to 
30  years  old. 

"Are  you  Don  A.  Ituarte?" 

"You  know  me  very  well,"  impassively  an- 
swered the  victim. 

"I  told  you  twice  to  leave  the  city  and  that  the 
third  time  I  would  shoot  you." 

"That's  right." 

"Well,  then  I  am  going  to  shoot  you  on  the 
spot." 

"All  right." 

Before  leaving,  Ituarte  turned  to  Teran  and  said 
to  him:  "Assassin" 

Then  came  the  turn  of  Cueto. 

"Are  you  D.  F.  Cueto?" 

"You  know  it  as  well  as  I  do." 

"Shoot  him"  exclaimed  Teran. 

"I  believe,"  said  Cueto  "that  if  I  am  guilty  of 
any  crime,  I  should  be  judged  first.  Of  what  are  they 
accusing  me?" 

"  You  are  conspiring." 

"In  this  case  turn  me  over  to  a  judge,  who  must 
be  the  district  judge." 

"There  is  no  other  judge  than  myself  here,  and 
no  law  other  than  my  command.     Shoot  him." 

Later  Don  Luis  Alba  arrived : 


44 


"Are  you  going  to  shoot  me  too,  christian?"  he 
asked  Teran,  with  whom  he  was  on  very  friendly  terms. 

"I'll  do  it  this  minute." 

"Are  you  crazy?  Don't  you  think  that  suf- 
ficient blood  has  been  shed?  What  am  I  guilty  of? 
What  is  my  crime?" 

"Silence!"  yelled  Teran — "  "You  are  conspiring 
and  it  is  necessary  that  you  should  die." 

"I  suppose  that  you  have  a  proof  of  your 
assertion." 

"I  do  not  need  proofs  other  than  my  conscience." 

"Then,  you  have  no  proofs,  christian,  for  you 
have  no  conscience." 

Hearing  this,  Teran  gave  him  a  push  and  shouted : 
"Shoot  this  man." 

The  victim  then  begged  to  be  allowed  to  write  to 
his  wife. 

Said  Teran :"  Nothing  will  be  permitted,  you 
are  a  lerdist,  and  to  those  nothing  is  conceded." 

"Remember,  sir,  that  the  lerdists  pardoned 
3v'our  life,  when  you  were  caught  with  arms  in  hand." 

"  Muzzle  this  man  and  shoot  him." 

At  this  juncture  there  arrived  at  the  barracks  the 
judge  of  the  district  Mr.  R.  Zayas  Enriquez,  whom 
some  neighbours  had  awakened  and  had  begged  to  see 
if  he  could  prevent  further  slaughters. 

Mr.  Zayas  Enriquez  ran  to  the  barracks  half 
dressed,  and  there  had  an  angry  discussion  with  Gen. 
Teran  who  said  to  him; 

"You  are  responsible  for  all  this." 

"I?"  exclaimed  Zayas  in  astonishment. 

"Yes,  you,  because  the  other  day  when  I  turned 
over  to  you  Capmany  and  Portilla,  you  did  not  con- 
demn them  to  hard  labor." 

"Because  I  am  an  honest  man,  Mr.  Teran,  and 
I  do  not  condenm  without  legal  proofs;  I  am  neither  an 
assassin  nor  a  bailiff,  only  a  district  judge ;  I  am  here  to 
enforce  and  see  that  the  law  is  enforced,  not  to  defeat 
justice." 

4^ 


"  Well,  what  has  been  done,  has  been  done." 

"I  hope  that  this  bacchanalia  of  blood  will  end 
here." 

We  know  that  Mr.  Zayas  prevented  a  continuation 
of  the  slaughter,  for  it  seems  that  Suarez  and  Galimie 
were  to  follow  the  aforementioned  victims. 

At  daybreak  of  the  25th,  various  ladies  escorted 
by  a  great  many  little  children  were  wandering  through 
the  streets  stopping  the  passersby  asking  them  about 
their  husbands. 

"What  do  you  know  of  Lorenzo?"  questioned 
the  half  crazed  wife  of  Portilla  (one  of  the  victims)  to  all 
who  passed  her,  but  no  one  dared  tell  her  the  sad 
news. 

The  wife  of  Cueto  lost  her  reason,  and  they  are 
afraid  for  her  life;  his  mother  is  in  Orizaba  in  agony. — 
The  whole  population  is  in  mourning,  and  Teran 
dares  not  leave  the  barracks. 

Mr.  Zayas  in  the  name  of  Freemasonry,  asked  for 
the  bodies  of  Cueto  and  Capmany,  both  brother  masons 
but  the  bodies  were  refused  him,  and  they  were 
buried  in  the  potters  field,  in  an  imknown  place, 
carried  there  in  a  cart  escorted  by  the  police."  (i) 

There  Uves  now  in  New  York  a  Mexican  gentleman 
by  the  name  of  Rafael  de  Zayas  Bnriquez,  who  left 
Mexico  because  of  the  political  conditions  there  and  on 
accoimt  of  the  persecutions  of  J.  Y.  Limantour,  whom 
he  had  attacked  in  public  speeches  and  in  newspaper 
articles.  This  gentleman  who  is  a  lawyer,  an  histor- 
ian and  a  writer  of  great  talent  came  to  New  York  so 
as  to  be  able  to  write  with  freedom  about  actual  condi- 
tions in  Mexico. 

After  over  a  year  of  work  he  finished  a  book 
"  Porfirio  Diaz".  It  is  a  phsycological  and  philosophical 
review  of  the  life  of  the  president.  It  is  a  clever  and 
subtle  criticism,  but  not  sincere,  for  it  does  not  tell  the 
truth ;  only  every  now  and  then  does  he  make  a  feint  at 

(1)     Juan  Panadero.     Guadalajara.     13  Julio.  1879. 

46 


it  as  with  a  foil ;  but  he  is  only  playing,  inasmuch  as  h* 
seems  to  be  afraid. 

Maybe  he  is  apprehensive  of  the  danger  of  the  long 
arm  of  Porfirio  Diaz  reaching  him  treacherously  even 
in  this  land  of  freedom. 

It  is  quite  probable  that  he  knows  what  happened 
two  years  ago.  An  article  criticizing  Porfirio  Diaz  and 
J.  Y.  Limantour  appeared  in  the  World  signed  "  A  Mex- 
ican". Shortly  afterward  two  Mexican  gentlemen 
asked  for  the  name  of  the  author  of  that  anonymous 
article,  offering  money  for  the  information.  This  was 
refused  by  the  management  of  the  World  as  being 
against  newspaper  etiquette.  These  gentlemen  then 
left  in  disgust  but  not  without  covert  threats  against 
the  unknown  writer. 

This  same  Mr.  Zayas  Enriquez  was  district  judge 
during  the  famous  night  of  the  24th  of  June  in  Vera- 
Cruz.  He  knows  all  the  details  of  that  affair,  better 
than  anyone  else  in  Mexico.  Why  did  he  not  publish 
the  truth  instead  of  tr>^ing  to  palliate  the  responsibility 
of  Gen.  Diaz,  as  he  knows  that  the  only  responsible 
head  was  Porfirio  Diaz  and  not  Teran  who  was  only  a 
despicable  tool? 

The  Diaz  government  was  then  very  much  alarmed 
at  the  horror  and  indignation  caused  by  that  savage  act, 
and  it  had  the  impudence  to  make  an  official  statement, 
claiming  that  the  murdered  men  had  attacked  the  sol- 
diers of  the  barracks  and  that  in  the  accomplishment  of 
a  military  duty  these  had  fired  on  the  aggressors  killing 
them. 

In  that  period  Porfirio  Diaz  looked  with  a  certain 
respect  on  public  opinion  and  therefore  he  hid  under  the 
cloak  of  calumny  to  save  Teran  from  punishment  and 
to  ward  off  his  head  the  stigma  of  Murderer. 

To  prove  the  absurdity  of  the  calumny  the  bodies 
of  the  murdered  men  were  exhumed  by  Mr.  de  Zayas; 
it  was  found  that  each  one  of  these  had,  besides  several 
bullet  holes  in  various  parts  of  the  body,  one  hole  in 
the  temple,  the  finishing  stroke,  "le  coup  de  grace' 

47 


which  is  only  given  to  the  people  condemned  to  capital 
punishment.  One  man  only  did  not  have  this  charac- 
teristic bullet  hole,  as  he  had  died  instantaneously  of  a 
wound  through  the  heart.  All  the  details  of  the  exhum- 
ation and  investigation  were  set  forth  in  a  book  pub- 
lished by  the  attorneys  of  Teran  in  1879.  The  govern- 
ment bought  all  the  copies  but  one,  which  copy  came 
luckily  under  my  notice. 

The  Murders  of  Gen.  Ramon  Corona,  Gen.  Gar- 
cia DE  i,A  Cadena  and  Gen.  Angel  Martinez. 

Porfirio  Diaz  knew  that  as  long  as  there  existed  in 
Mexico  one  or  more  generals  with  ambitions  to  the 
presidency,  his  own  dreams  of  a  continuous  power  with 
himself  as  the  Archangel,  could  not  be  practicable  but 
might  be  an  highly  hazardous  business. 

As  his  own  popularity  had  suffered  a  setback  on 
account  of  the  Vera-Cruz  murders,  and  not  being  then 
quite  powerful  enough  to  dictate  all  the  elections  in  all 
the  states  with  the  bayonets  of  his  soldiers,  he  resorted 
to  the  method  of  cowards,  that  of  assassinating  his 
rivals  by  means  of  "accidents",  using  either  a  crazy  or 
fanatical  individual  with  a  grudge  against  the  selected 
victim,  or  simply  a  salaried  thug. 

Gen.  Corona  was  one  of  the  most  popular,  magnetic 
personalities  among  the  generals  of  the  war  of  Inter- 
vention. He  was  brave,  intelligent,  frank  and  loyal. 
During  the  first  term  of  President  Diaz  he  was  sent  to 
Spain  as  a  minister  of  Mexico.  There,  as  it  happened 
everywhere  he  went,  he  became  the  favorite  of  the 
Spaniards.  Nevertheless  as  he  was  ambitious  for  the 
presidency,  he  found  a  ready  excuse  in  the  attitude  of 
the  Spanish  Queen  towards  him  to  warrant  his  return  to 
Mexico.  Gen.  Corona  was  one  of  the  generals  who  had 
helped  to  capture  Queretaro,  and  was  therefore  indir- 
ectly responsible  for  the  seizure  and  execution  of  Em- 
peror Maximilian.  The  Spanish  Queen  being  an  Aus- 
trian and  a  Hapsburg,  snubbed  him  at  one  of  the 
official  receptions. 

48 


On  his  return  he  was  made  governor  of  the  State  of 
Jalisco,  the  first  state  in  Mexico  in  wealth  and 
population. 

He  proved  to  be  a  very  good  governor,  and  was 
the  first  one  to  lower  in  his  state  the  "alcabalas"  or 
custom  house  duties  which  then  existed  in  Mexico  from 
state  to  state  and  likewise  from  city  to  city,  compli- 
cating the  fiscal  administration  and  encouraging  contra- 
band. 

His  prestige  as  a  governor  and  as  a  presidential 
candidate  increased  at  such  an  alarming  rate  that 
Porfirio  Diaz  became  frightened  for  his  own  supremacy, 
and  to  ward  off  an  imminent  danger  and  to  placate  Cor- 
ona's ambition  promised  him  the  presidency  in  the 
following  term,  calculating  on  an  "  accident"  to  elimi- 
nate him. 

One  night  as  Gen.  Corona  was  going  to  the  theatre 
with  his  wife  and  children,  he  was  attacked  and  stabbed 
to  death  by  an  Indian  of  the  lower  class.  The  murderer 
ran  away  quickly  round  the  block  and  there  by  quite  a 
strange  "coincidence"  was  stabbed  through  the  heart 
by  a  mounted  policeman  and  also  wounded  by  some 
foot  policemen.  The  peculiarity  of  this  "coincidence" 
is  intensified  by  the  fact  that  the  policeman  who 
stabbed  the  murderer  was  accompanied  by  a  whole 
squad  of  policemen  who  could  not  have  seen  the  murder 
of  Gen.  Corona  but  acted  exactly  as  if  they  had  seen  it; 
they  did  not  intend  to  capture  him  alive,  but  killed 
him  speedily,  for  dead  men  tell  no  tales.  The  rumor 
was  disseminated  purposely  that  the  murderer  had  com- 
mitted suicide. 

As  Ignacio  Mariscal  very  appropriately  said  in  ref- 
erence to  the  murder  of  Gen.  Barillas,  ex-president  of 
Guatemala,  who  was  assassinated  in  Mexico  city  by  two 
Guatemalian  boys,  on  the  17th  of  April  1907,  by  order 
af  Gen.  Lima,  minister  of  war  in  Guatemala;  "in  this 
class  of  crimes,  for  the  difficulty  which  exists  in  proving 
the  real  author  of  the  deed, the  sentence  of  public  opin- 

49 


ion  which  declares  President  Cabrera  the  murderer  of 
Gen.  Barillas,  is  sufficient." 

Public  opinion  in  Mexico  points  out  Gen.  Porfirio 
Diaz  as  the  assassin  of  Gen.  Corona,  Gen.  de  la  Cadena 
and  Gen.  Martinez. 

Gen.  de  la  Cadena  was  another  ambitious  general. 
He  was  rash  enough  to  tell  the  truth  to  President  Diaz. 
He  realized  his  mistake  when  it  was  too  late.  He  was 
watched  day  and  night,  but  played  the  sick  man  in  his 
house  and  did  not  receive  anybody,  his  wife  cooking 
and  bringing  him  his  food  personally.  However  they 
did  not  discover  that  the  woman  servant  in  the  house 
was  a  spy  of  Porfirio  Diaz.  Gen.  de  la  Cadena  fooled 
the  chief  of  police  so  that  when  this  worthy  gentleman 
went  to  the  president  to  tell  him  that  Gen.  de  la  Cadena 
had  escaped,  the  president  informed  him  when  the 
general  had  escaped  and  even  where  he  was  to  be  found. 

Gen.  de  la  Cadena  tried  to  escape  from  Mexico 
but  he  was  caught  near  Zatecas  and  while  trying  to 
change  from  one  train  to  the  other  he  was  murdered 
by  a  band  of  hired  thugs.  This  elimination  was  put 
on   to   the   account  of  bandits. 

The  destruction  of  Gen.  Martinez  was  accomplished 
in  exactly  the  same  manner  as  in  the  case  of  Gen.  Bar- 
illas, or  better  said  the  murder  of  Gen.  Barillas  was  an 
imitation  of  the  Martinez  affair. 

Gen.  Barillas  was  a  political  refugee  from  Guate- 
mala because  of  his  presidential  ambitions.  In  this  case 
Gen.  Lima  was  the  tool  used  by  President  Cabrera,  and 
as  Morales  the  assassin  of  Barillas  declared  on  the  stand 
in  Mexico:  "the  order  to  kill  comes  from  'higher  up', 
from  the  government  and  I  was  afraid  of  what  might 
happen  to  me  if  I  should  disobey."  (i) 

Gen.  Martinez  was  a  doctor  besides  being  a  soldier 
and  a  revolutionist,  he  had  also  been  a  partisan  of  Por- 
firio Diaz  in  the  revolution  of  Tuxtepec.  He  quarreled 
with  the  President  and  thereupon  sailed  to  Europe.     On 

(1)  El  Diario  Ilustrado.  9  June  07.  Mexico. 

50 


his  return  he  settled  in  New  Laredo,  Texas,  where  he 
was  peacefully  exercising  his  profession  as  a  doctor. 
One  evening  he  was  called  ostensibly  to  attend  to  a 
patient  and  on  his  way  thither  was  waylaid  and  mur- 
dered by  a  negro  who  immediately  afterward  crossed 
the  Mexican  frontier. 

In  this  instance  Gen.  Bernardo  Reyes  was  the  Gen. 
Lima  of  President  Diaz.  A  mayor  engineered  the  am- 
bush, and  on  the  same  day  as  the  assassination  of 
Gen.  Martinez  sent  a  telegram  to  General  Reyes, 
Governor  of  Nuevo  Leon,  which  ran  thus:  "Your 
order  obeyed." 

The  cases  are  parallel,  with  but  this  difference; 
that  in  the  Martinez  affair  no  notice  was  taken,  as  the 
murder  was  not  known  to  be  of  a  political  nature;  in 
the  Barillas  murder,  the  press  of  Mexico  and  the  Assoc- 
iated Press  gave  it  a  world  wide  publicity.  The 
secrecy  of  the  proceedings  used  by  Porfirio  Diaz,  shows 
only  a  few  facets  of  his  political  conduct  and  then  only 
the  best  side,  which  is  why  he  stands  in  the  minds  of  the 
uninitiated  as  a  great  statesman  and  a  benefactor  to  his 
coimtry.  Cabrera,  on  the  contrary,  through  the  pub- 
licity of  his  deeds  is  execrated  as  a  modem  Nero.  But 
Cabrera  excuses  himself  by  claiming  that  he  is  only 
imitating  Gen.  Diaz  for  whom  he  has  nothing  but  the 
most  sincere  admiration. 

The  Carnage  of  Orizaba. 

Just  about  two  years  ago  the  news  was  telegraphed 
to  Mexico  that  some  strikers  in  Orizaba,  (state  of  Vera- 
Cruz)  had  pillaged  and  burned  a  store,  but  that  after 
the  troops,  sent  by  the  government  had  shot  a  few 
aggressive  workingmen,  everything  became  peaceful 
again.  Nevertheless  rumors  went  round  the  city  of 
horrors  committed  by  the  soldiers  by  order  of  the  pres- 
ident. It  was  only  after  a  very  careful  investigation 
that  I  was  able  to  get  the  details  of  the  whole  affair. 

The  strike  in  Orizaba  was  a  capitahstic,  not  a  work- 
ingman's  strike.     There  were  then  about  92   textile 

51 


mills  in  Mexico  which  paid  altogether  over  two  millions 
and  a  half  annually  in  taxes  to  the  government.  This 
contribution  the  mill  owners  considered  excessive; 
accordingly  they  resolved  to  bring  about  a  strike,  so 
as  to  be  in  a  position  either  to  shut  down  the  mills  and 
dictate  their  own  terms  to  the  mill  hands  or  to  endea- 
vor to  goad  the  workingmen  into  such  desperate 
straits  that  they  might  provoke  a  revolution,  which 
would  bring  about  a  new  state  of  affairs. 

After  the  shooting  in  Orizaba  the  "  El  Diario"  had 
a  visit  from  a  man  purporting  to  be  a  labor  leader,  who 
wanted  to  know  if  we  would  stand  by  a  conspiracy  of 
theirs,  as  the  Diario  had  sided  with  them  during 
the  strike  while  all  the  other  newspapers  had  defended 
the  mill  owners. 

This  man  revealed  a  terrible  plot,  which  consisted 
in  destroying  by  fire  or  dynamite  all  the  mills  operating 
in  Mexico,  if  the  owners  did  not  come  to  reasonable 
terms.  The  Diario  answered  that  it  could  and  would 
not  even  entertain  such  a  thought,  that  it  was  in  bus- 
iness to  publish  news,  not  to  incite  revolutions  or 
encourage  the  destruction  of  property. 

This  incident  shows  to  what  a  degree  of  bitterness 
and  distress  the  men  had  reached  when  they  could  even 
suggest  such  a  fiendish  act. 

The  strike  had  started  this  way:  In  Puebla  the 
union  had  given  orders  to  a  mill  to  stop  work;  this  union 
was  assisted  with  money  by  the  Orizaba  mill  hands  who 
were  then  working.  The  Puebla  mill  owners  com- 
plained of  this  to  the  proprietors  of  the  Orizaba  factor- 
ies, on  which  these  gentlemen  shut  down  their  mills, 
thus  cutting  off  the  source  of  help  of  the  Puebla  work- 
ingmen. By  these  tactics  the  Puebla  union  was 
brought  to  terms  and  after  this  was  effected  the  Orizaba 
owners  opened  their  mills  again. 

But  there  arose  a  new  difficulty,  as  the  Orizaba 
union  claimed  better  terms  before  going  back  to  work. 
This  was  refused  and  the  strike  began  anew.  Mean- 
while the  strikers  had  sent  a  commission  to  the  president 

52 


to  get  his  help  and  influence  in  settling  their  conditions 
and  demands. 

Porfirio  Diaz  promised  to  help  them,  and  to  this 
effect  he  sent  a  commission  down  to  Orizaba.  This 
commission  called  a  meeting  in  a  theatre  and  promised 
that  if  the  workmen  would  go  to  work  they  would  get 
their  demands. 

The  strikers  accepted  this  compromise  and  went 
back  to  work. 

In  the  morning  some  of  the  women  went  to  the 
store  of  a  Frenchman,  who  gave  the  factory  hands 
credit  on  victuals  in  exchange  for  checks  distributed 
instead  of  money  by  the  mill  owners.  As  the  hungry 
women  went  into  the  shop,  this  man  began  in- 
sulting them  and  their  families  with  vile  and  indecent 
language.  The  women  returned  home  and  indig- 
nantly related  the  happening  to  their  husbands  urg- 
ing them  to  avenge  them.  Infuriated  by  the  humilia- 
tions, the  hunger,  the  sacrifices  undergone  for  the 
sake  of  the  strike,  these  men  had  their  cup  of  bitterness 
filled  to  the  brim,  and  their  anger  vented  itself  on  the 
man  who  had  added  the  drop  which  made  it  overflow. 
They  became  immanageable,  and  cursed  by  the  women 
as  cowards  and  curs  they  attacked  the  shop,  sack- 
ing and  burning  it.  The  pohce  had  no  trouble  in 
quieting  and  dispersing  the  mob,  and  through  the 
efforts  of  the  jefe  politico,  who  was  very  much  liked 
in  Orizaba,  the  workingmen  were  induced  to  go 
back  to  work  peaceably.  Everything  was  quiet  again, 
the  offenders  responsible  for  the  assault  and  the 
burning  of  the  shop  were  arrested.  The  "El  Diario" 
was  the  only  paper  which  had  dared  tell  the  truth 
and  in  an  editorial  had  put  the  responsibiHty  of  the 
riot  on  the  Frenchman.  This  man  hastened  to  the 
office  of  "El  Diario"  and  had  the  impudence  to  offer 
$5,000  for  another  editorial  which  would  rehabili- 
tate him.     His  request  was  politely  refused. 

Public  opinion  favored  the  strikers,  and  all  be- 
lieved that  the  whole  affair  had  ended  with  the  appre- 

63 


hension  of  the  rioters.  But  notwithstanding  the  fact 
that  everything  was  calm  and  that  the  mill  hands  had 
all  gone  back  to  w^ork  peaceably,  President  Diaz  sud- 
denly and  unexpectedly  gave  orders  to  the  sub- 
secretary  of  War,  to  go  down  to  Orizaba  with 
a  few  hundred  soldiers.  Mind  you,  everybody  and 
everything  was  perfectly  tranquil  and  quiet,  no 
attempt  had  been  made  by  the  workmen  to  create 
any  further  disturbance. 

Notwithstanding  this,  the  two  official  execu- 
tioners hastened  to  Orizaba,  and  there  posted  their 
soldiers  in  the  mills  behind  pillars  and  walls.  When  the 
men  and  women  entered  the  different  factories  to  go  to 
work,  the  soldiers  started  a  murderous  fusillade, 
mowing  down  the  helpless  mass  of  humanity  like  a 
pack  of  rabid  dogs.  The  noise  was  terrific,  the  uproar 
undescribable,  the  clamor  of  despair  and  horror  from 
the  wounded  and  slaughtered  people  beyond  human 
description.  It  was  a  perfect  pandemonium,  not  of 
battle,  but  of  a  cruel,  relentless,  coldblooded  man-hunt, 
the  massacre  of  innocent,  helpless,  unarmed  men, 
women  and  children.  The  cracking  of  rifles,  the  smoke, 
the  dust  arising  from  stray  bullets,  the  blood  spurting 
in  torrents  from  gaping  wounds;  here  and  there  pros- 
trate bodies  with  their  heads  almost  shot  off,  the  brains 
spattering  walls  and  floors,  made  a  picture,  sickening, 
revolting  and  unparalleled  in  the  history  of  civilization. 
Not  content  with  this  the  commanders  ordered  the 
soldiers  to  follow  up  their  victory  and  the  murderous 
sharpshooting  continued  into  the  streets,  the  raking  fire 
was  directed  through  the  windows  into  the  houses  of 
the  workingmen  who  had  sought  refuge  there,  pursu- 
ing the  carnage  of  innocent  women  and  children. 
Further  orders  were  given  to  the  rurales*  to  hunt  the 
fleeing  men  into  the  country,  into  the  fields,  even 
chasing  after  them  into  the  motmtains.  But  the 
rurales  who  are  used  to  all  kinds  of  rough  work  refused 

♦  Country  Police 

54 


to  obey  the  command  to  shoot  helpless  men  and  wo- 
men, so  orders  were  given  to  shoot  the  rurales  too. 
The  number  of  victims  amoimted  from  650  to  700. 
On  the  same  night  of  the  carnage  from  450  to  500 
mangled  corpses  of  the  murdered  workingmen  and 
women,  were  taken  stealthily  to  the  railroad  station, 
there  laid  on  flat  cars  and  covered  with  straw.  The 
conductor  who  was  to  drive  this  funeral  train  to 
Vera-Cruz  refused  to  do  so.  They  found  another 
less  scrupulous  conductor  who  drove  the  train  to 
Vera-Cruz  on  to  the  wharf.  The  corpses  were  taken 
from  there  in  boats  out  into  the  bay  and  there  thrown 
into  the  sea  as  food  for  the  sharks. 

This  was  the  finishing  stroke  of  the  most  brutish, 
the  most  craven  and  the  wildest  orgie  of  blood  perpe- 
trated in  the  annals  of  humanity;  it  was  an  insensate 
SatumaHa  of  Gore,  the  luxurious  rage  of  an  impotent, 
cowardly,  sadic  old  despot. 


M 


Tyranny  is  evil,  because  it  is  impossible  that  under 
it  the  genius  of  a  people  should  develop  and  _have  free 
play 

Mazzini. 


The  System. 

A  PouTiCAi,  Mafia.    Its  Resui^ts. 

When  an  individual  or  a  group  of  individuals 
creates  a  system,  be  it  political,  social  or  commercial, 
they  make  themselves  responsible  for  the  good  as  well 
as  the  evil  consequences  resulting  from  this  system, 

Porfirio  Diaz  is  always  itching  for  the  flattery  and 
praise  for  the  redundand  prosperity  in  Mexico;  but 
upon  his  white  head  rests  also  the  responsibility  of  the 
nefarious  effects  of  his  political  mafia,  his  legalized 
black  hand,  the  true,  legitimate  sons  of  his  powerful 
and  abstruse,  statesman -like  cogitations. 

When  a  ruler  orders  his  vassals  to  murder  at  his 
bidding,  be  they  governors,  jefes  politicos  or  just  his 
friends,  he  is  by  professional  etiquette  supposed  to 
close  his  eyes  or  wink  at  their  own  private  vengeances 
and  delinquencies.  The  jefe  politico  has  been  the  most 
useful  tool  of  the  government.  "The  most  cruel  instru- 
ment of  despotism — of  the  low  and  tenebrous  despotism 
of  the  "ley  fuga" — without  any  doubt,  the  jefe  politico 
has  been  the  most  acute  public  calamity  to  Mexican 
society  (i)  And  the  governors:  "the  majority  of  our 
governors  are  cordially  detested  by  the  people  of  the 
respective  states. 

"Each  one  of  these  people  would  make  any  sacrifice 
to  get  rid  of  the  governor  of  his  State."  (2) 

But  they  cannot,  as  each  governor  is  chosen  by  the 
president  as  a  reward  for  loyalty  or  as  a  sop  to  their 
ambitions.  Sometimes,  but  very  rarely,  they  rule 
justly  and  lawfully,  but  more  frequently  they  graft, 
murder  and  break  all  the  ten  commandments  and  all 
the  penal  codes,  knowing  well  that  P6rfirio  Diaz  will 
ignore  intentionally  all  the  outrages,  spoilations,  injur- 

(1)  Hada  donde  vamos.  0-  Moheno.  pag.  39. 

(2)  Idem.     pag.  15. 

69 


ies  and  foul  play  perpetrated  by  them  so  long  as  they  do 
not  play  politics  against  Porfirio  Diaz. 

A  fair  type  of  the  unscrupulous,  perverse,  incom- 
petent, stupid,  all  powerful  governor  is  here  dascribed. 
I  shall  relate  a  characteristic  example  of  his  govern- 
mental methods. 

About  the  year  1891  the  theme  of  all  the  conversa- 
tions in  Puebla  was  the  rape  of  two  young  girls, 
daughters  of  a  German  watchmaker  named  Weber. 
Public  opinion  pointed  out  as  author  of  this  outrage 
the  Governor  who,  through  his  social  and  political 
position    kept  himself  beyond  the  reach  of  the  law. 

A  newspaper  man  of  Puebla  took  upon  himself  to 
expose  the  details  of  the  affair,  calling  attention  to  the 
fact  that  the  persons  responsible  for  this  act  of  saty- 
riasis were  a  high  functionary  of  the  State  and  a  very 
rich  Mexican  gentleman.  This  writer  drew  upon  his 
head  the  ire  and  hatred  of  the  allmighty  governor,  who 
awaited  his  opportunity  to  revenge  himself. 

Two  thugs  (one  of  whom  was  murdered  later  on) 
in  the  pay  of  the  governor,  received  orders  to  waylay 
the  newspaper  man  and  "  give  him  water", '  darle  agua", 
a  term  used  in  Mexico  to  designate  official  murder. 

One  night  while  the  latter  and  several  friends 
were  sitting  round  a  table  in  a  cantina  there  passed 
one  of  the  governor's  secret  police  who  seeing  the 
journalist,  beckoned  him  aside  to  invite  him  to  a 
dance.  He  accepted  the  invitation,  but  as  he  had  been 
drinking  heavily  his  friends  begged  him  to  remain  with 
them.  But  he  gave  no  heed  to  this  warning  and 
followed  the  would-be  host  who  was  accompanied  by 
another  secret  service  man. 

On  their  way  they  passed  through  a  side  street, 
in  which,  by  a  quaint  coincidence,  there  lived  a  sweet- 
heart of  the  governor.  There,  almost  imder  the  window 
of  this  woman  the  two  cut-throats  caught  the  news- 
paper man,  one  pinning  his  arms  behind,  while  the 
other  was  stabbing  him  to  death.  So  swiftly  and 
expeditiously  was  the  deed  committed,  that  the  vic- 

60 


tim  had  no  time  to  open  his  mouth  to  raise  an  alarm. 
There  was  nothing  which  could  give  a  clue  to  the 
assassin. 

In  the  morning  the  governor's  sweetheart  leaning 
over  her  balcony  witnessed  the  horrible  spectacle 
ofifered  by  the  body  lying  on  its  back  steeped  in  a  pud- 
dle of  blood,  eyes  wide  open,  hands  contracted,  im- 
bedded in  the  mud,  in  sign  of  the  silent  struggle  waged 
against  his  murderers. 

Several  papers  in  Mexico  City,  among  which  the 
"Monitor  Republicano"  and  "Gil  Bias",  treated  the 
matter  extensively,  but  before  it  took  a  scandalous  turn 
the  Governor  sent  there  a  congressman,  who  settled  the 
biisiness  with  money,  much  money,  and  thus  the  Press 
was  silenced. 

To  exculpate  himself  before  public  opinion,  the 
Governor  put  forward  as  responsible  for  the  double 
abduction  a  friend  of  his,  who  offered  to  marry  either 
one  of  the  girls.  But  neither  of  these  two  victims  of 
the  lustful  governor  accepted  the  proposition. 

Once  upon  a  time  there  lived  a  governor,  in  Guana- 
juato, who  had  heard  of  the  great  fortunes  made  by  the 
culture  of  silk  worms.  After  laborious  but  inefficacious 
reading  of  treatises  on  the  subject,  he  became  impressed 
by  one  paramount  and  orthodox  fact,  that  mulberry 
trees  were  essential  to  the  growth  and  culture  of  silk 
worms.  So  he  hastily  proceeded  to  uproot  the  trees 
in  the  alameda  (public  square)  and  mulberry  trees 
were  planted  in  their  stead.  The  mulberry  trees  grew 
and  expanded  their  emerald  green  foliage,  while  the 
impatient  governor  made  it  his  official  duty,  to  inspect 
the  bonanza  trees  with  care  and  amore.  One  fine  day 
after  having  scrutinized  the  leaves,  he  turned  to  his 
aide-de-camp  and  exclaimed  angrily;  "They  have 
deceived  me;  here  I  have  wasted  money  and  time  on 
these  mulberry  trees  and  not  one  silk  worm  has  made 
its  appearance  as  yet!"  To  think  that  this  man  was  a 
rival  of  P.  Diaz. 

The  governor's  power  is  almost  supreme  in  his 

61 


state;  Porfirio  Diaz  is  the  Czar  of  Mexico  and  his  gover- 
nors are  his  grand-dukes. 

"Each  one  of  our  governors,  dreams  in  his  sphere 
of  local  government,  to  be  a  General  Diaz  in  miniature. 
From  this  follows  their  grotesque  attempt  to  imitate 
the  model.  There  are  governors  who  take  their  daily 
cold  plunge  at  5  in  the  morning,  because  they  know  or 
think  General  Diaz  does  the  same  and  imagine  that  the 
moral  value  of  the  president  has  its  root  in  the  ablu- 
tions." (i) 

There  was  wonderful  specimen  of  the  unconscious, 
I  should  say  amoral  type  of  the  Diaz  governor.  He 
ruled  long,  too  long  for  the  long-suffering  state  of 
Hidalgo;  one  term  more  and  he  would  have  owned 
every  square  inch  of  that  state.  He  confiscated 
property  on  the  slightest  pretext;  robbed,  murdered 
and  destroyed  everything  and  everybody  interfering 
with  his  greedy  lust  for  possession  and  indisputable 
power.  The  list  of  his  official  murders  is  formidable. 
His  pet  enemies  were  newspaper  men.  These  martyrs 
of  a  hopeless  cause  were  destroyed  like  flies  on  a 
summer's  day.  One  case  among  the  many  is  so  abject 
and  fearful  as  to  challenge  incredulity. 

A  newspaper  man  after  repeated  beatings  insisted 
upon  showing  up  the  unlawful  official  acts  of  the  gov- 
ernor. Finally  he  was  beaten  insensible  and  then 
taken  bodily  into  a  brick-kiln  and  there  was  cremated 
alive ! 

From  this  example  one  realizes  the  sinfulness  of 
putting  so  much  power  into  the  hands  of  ignorant, 
greedy  and  unscrupulous  men. 

A  great  many  of  the  horrors  I  am  speaking  of  have 
happened  quite  awhile  ago,  but  the  situation  instead  of 
improving,  seems  to  deteriorate  and  corrupt  all  the  few 
good  elements  left. 

The  present  government  created  by  Porfirio  Diaz 
can  be  likened  to  a  basket  of  apples; the  fruit  on  top  has 
been  rubbed  and  cleaned  until  it  is  glowing  with  colors 

(1)  Hacia  donde  vamos.  0   Moheno.  pag.  14. 

62 


and  freshness — this  is  for  the  benefit  of  the  foreigners 
and  strangers;  but  should  you  lift  the  top  layer  of 
fruit,  you  would  be  disgusted  by  the  rotten,  putrid  and 
fetid  material  lying  tmdemeath — this  is  for  the  benefit 
of  the  Mexicans. 

Two  years  ago  on  a  hacienda  (farm),  belonging  to 
the  minister  of  justice,  a  yoimg  man  discovered  the 
body  of  a  man  of  the  middle  class,  in  a  state  of  im- 
pending putrefaction.  The  wotmds  were  not  those  of 
an  accident  and  his  valuables  had  been  left  untouched. 
He  reported  the  case  to  the  judge  of  the  district.  The 
judge  was  not  opening  an  investigation  or  seeming  to 
take  any  interest  in  trying  to  clear  up  the  mystery. 
Nobody  appeared  to  know  the  man  nor  the  cause  of 
his  death.  The  young  man  finally  insisted  on  the 
necessity  of  the  judge's  attending  to  his  official  duties, 
whereupon  the  judge  in  self-defense  showed  him  a 
telegram  from  the  federal  government,  advising  him 
not  to  investigate  inLo  the  "accident". 

The  minister  of  justice  was  very  indignant  that 
his  hacienda  was  being  used  for  such  purposes,  for 
assuredly  it  was  a  diabolic  invention  to  use  the  farm 
of  the  administrator  of  justice  for  the  cosummation  of 
a  crime.  But  murder  will  out,  and  it  was  discovered 
that  the  person  responsible  for  the  deed  was  none  other 
than  the  jefe  politico  who  rid  himself  or  rid  the  gov- 
ernor of  an  enemy.  This  governor  is  a  relative  of 
Porfirio  Diaz. 

An  important  sinecure  is  the  governorship  of 
of  the  federal  district;  next  to  it  comes  the  chief  of 
police  of  Mexico  City. 

About  ten  years  ago  they  had  a  chief  of  police 
whose  evil  ways  brought  about  his  own  destruction. 
But  meanwhile  he  ruled  outrageously  and  without  fear 
of  intervention  from  the  benign  Porfirio  Diaz. 

This  Chief  of  Police  had  fallen  in  love  with  a  yotmg 
girl  whom  he  expected  to  marry  in  the  near  future. 
Now  the  confessor  of  this  girl  who  was  aware  of  the 

63 


character  of  chief,  opposed  his  spiritual  influence  to 
the  marriage. 

One  night  the  poor  padre  was  taken  to  the  police 
station;  there  he  underwent  a  sort  of  a  third  degree; 
they  tied  him  to  a  bench  and  with  a  funnel  forced 
him  to  swallow  enormous  quantities  of  alcohol  until 
they  had  provoked  a  congestion.  Thereupon  he  was 
taken  to  the  street  and  made  to  lean  gently  against 
a  telephone  pole,  where  the  police  picked  him  up  later, 
as  being  ostensibly  in  a  state  of  unconscious  ebriety. 
The  unfortunate  padre  died  of  congestion  and  he  was 
buried  in  the  common  graveyard,  as  nobody  had 
recognized   the  dead  priest. 

When  the  family  noted  the  disappearance  of  their 
kinsman  they  realized  who  the  unknown  dead  man, 
was.  The  clerical  press  mentioned  the  incident  in  ex- 
tenso,  but  no  notice  of  it  was  taken  by  the  authori- 
ties, and  the  chief  of  police  continued  his  artistic 
career. 

One  of  the  machiavellian  tactics  of  Porfirio  Diaz 
consists  in  having  an  heterogenous  cabinet,  that  is  to 
say,  a  cabinet  in  which  the  ministers  are  of  opposite 
p)olitical  ideas  and  are  even  inimical  to  one  another,  so 
as  to  prevent  any  accord  between  themselves.  That 
is  the  reason  that  although  there  are  no  political  parties 
in  Mexico,  there  exist  political  groups,  headed  by  two  or 
three  ministers  who  covertly  war  against  each  other. 

Romero  Rubio,  Dublan,  Pacheco,  Baranda,  Liman- 
tour  and  Reyes  have  been  the  most  prominent  chiefs 
of  these  groups,  with  the  acquiesence  of  the  President. 

The  most  powerful  of  these  chiefs  has  been  and 
still  is  Limantour,  the  financial  partner  of  Porfirio  Diaz; 
and  when  things  have  almost  reached  the  breaking 
point,  the  ministers  who  are  enemies  of  Limantour  have 
been  ousted  in  a  fashion  more  or  less  scandalous.  So  it 
happened  with  Baranda  and  also  with  Gen.  Re3'^es. 

General  Bernardo  Reyes  is  a  man  famous  for  his 
cleverness  and  daring.  Porfirio  Diaz  kept  him  for  a 
long  time  at  the  head  of  the  state  of  Nuevo  Leon  where 

64 


he  made  a  reputation  as  a  skillful  governor.  But  the 
party  of  Limantour  became  too  powerful  and  was  so  far 
enboldened  as  to  indicate  Limantour  as  the  successor  of 
President  Diaz.  The  latter  then  called  in  General  Reyes 
as  Minister  of  War,  gave  him  ostensibly  his  protection, 
so  that  in  a  short  time  he  became  the  head  of  the 
"  Reyists"  with  Minister  Baranda  as  a  partner. 

But  according  to  the  phrase  of  Porfirio  Diaz, 
General  Reyes  "  learned  too  fast,"  as  he  had  organized  a 
"phalanx,"  the  "second  reserve,"  which  became  popular 
all  over  the  country.  Newspapers  were  started  foster- 
ing the  candidacy  of  Reyes,  making  war  to  the  knife  on 
Limantour  and 'creating  very  bitter  feeling. 

To  give  satisfaction  to  his  partner  Limantour  who 
is  very  useful  to  him,  Porfirio  Diaz  dismissed  Baranda 
and  Reyes  from  their  respective  ministries ;  but  as  Reyes 
was  necessary  to  him  as  a  check  to  the  "  cientificos" 
as  Limantour's  party  calls  itself,  he  replaced  Bernardo 
Reyes  as  Governor  of  Nuevo  Leon. 

Reyes  was,  like  all  the  governors  are,  disliked  in 
this  State,  for  the  many  murders  committed,  for  his 
arbitrary  and  despotic  character  and  other  sufficing 
reasons. 

The  inhabitants  of  Nuevo  Leon  wanted  to  shake 
their  yoke  and  conceived  the  brilliant  idea  of  nominat- 
ing a  candidate  of  their  own ;  and  for  this  purpose  they 
created  electoral  clubs  and  fostered  the  candidacy  of 
Don  Francisco  Reyes,  an  honorable  man  and  popular  in 
the  State. 

The  2nd  of  April,  1903,  on  the  eve  of  the  elections, 
the  partisians  of  the  new  candidate  organized  a  parade 
according  to  law.  Accompanied  by  a  brass  band,  the 
procession  started  from  the  alameda,  heading  toward 
the  centre  of  the  city,  with  the  hurrahs  and  shouts  in 
favor  of  Francisco  Reyes.  As  they  reached  the  princi- 
pal square,  in  front  of  the  governor's  palace,  a  broadside 
was  poured  into  them  by  the  police  on  the  roofs  of  the 
governor's  palace  and  the  adjoining  houses,  killing 
many    of    the    paraders,    among   whom   were   many 

6fi 


prominent  citizens.  In  this  manner  was  the  proces- 
sion stopped  and  the  candidacy  of  his  rival  squelched. 
To  escape  assassination  the  miforttmate  opponent  was 
obliged  to  flee  the  same  night  to  Mexico  City,  disguised 
as  a  fireman  of  the  locomotive  which  took  him  out  of 
Monterey.  On  his  arrival  in  Mexico  City,  Mr.  Francisco 
Reyes  complained  to  President  Diaz  who  promised 
him  a  fair  trial  and  justice.  The  Press  made  a  great 
deal  of  noise  on  the  subject  and  the  Limantourists  or 
"cientificos"  availed  themselves  of  this  occurence  to 
deal  a  death  blow  to  General  Reyes  by  accusing  him 
formally  in  Congress. 

But  the  expected  happened:  Porfirio  Diaz  gave 
orders  to  absolve  General  Reyes,  and  all  the  blame  was 
put  on  the  unlucky  paraders  "who  killed  each  other  in 
order  to  slander  the  distinguished  General  Reyes",  who 
triumphed  in  the  elections  and  who,  thanks  to  Porfirio 
Diaz,  continues  to  rule  the  State  of  Nuevo  Leon  in  peace 
as  a  lesson  and  punishment  to  the  people 

History  of  a  Great  Conspiracy. 

The  correct  heading  for  this  chapter  should  be: 
"the  history  of  two  great  crimes,  "for  two  men  were  assas- 
sinated so  as  to  efface  the  tracks  of  the  conspirator  who 
had  attempted  to  destroy  the  life  of  Porfirio  Diaz.  The 
personage  at  the  bottom  of  this  mysterious  plot  is 
known,  and  his  name  is  whispered  as  a  secret  behind 
closed  doors,  for  the  would-be-king  is  still  a  high 
government  ftmctionary.  He  failed  by  the  breadth  of 
a  hair,  by  the  turn  of  the  hand,  and  two  lives,  the  tools 
of  his  ambition,  were  crunched  to  keep  his  own  life 
intact.  Read  carefully  the  proceedings  of  the  trial, 
follow  attentively  the  scarlet  thread  nmning  through 
this  wonderful  maze  of  apparent  contradictions  and  the 
logical  and  evident  solution  of  the  riddle  will  jump  at 
you  like  a  jack  in  the  box  when  you  touch  the  right 
spring. 

It  is  the  tale  of  a  crime  for  a  crime,  illustrative  of 

66 


the  dangerous  and  perverse  system  created  by  Porfirio 
Diaz,  which  like  a  boomerang  flew  back  and  almost 
knocked  him  off  his  throne. 

On  the  1 6th  of  September  1897,  the  anniversary  of 
the  independence  of  Mexico,  as  customary,  the  Presi- 
dent was  walking  from  the  National  Palace  to  the 
Alameda,  escorted  by  the  high  functionaries  of  the 
realm,  and  surrounded  by  his  soldiers,  when  suddenly  a 
man  broke  the  protecting  line  of  bayonets,  and  rushing 
at  Diaz,  ere  anybody  could  stop  him,  struck  him  a  blow 
on  the  neck  which  staggered  but  did  not  fell  him  to  the 
groimd.  The  astonishment  and  confusion  were  intense ; 
a  score  of  officers  sword  and  pistol  in  hand  were  ready 
to  take  the  man's  life  as  a  swift  punishment  for  his 
daring.  But  the  President  commanded  them  to  desist 
from  violence  and  to  turn  him  over  to  the  proper 
authorities. 

The  individual  responsible  for  this  idiotic  and 
useless  attack  was  a  wretched,  imbalanced,  alcoholic 
being  by  the  name  of  Amulfo  Arroyo.  He  was  taken 
to  police  headquarters  and  there  by  order  of  the  Chief 
of  Police  was  put  in  a  straight  jacket  and  a  muzzle 
clapped  over  his  mouth.  "  More  than  once  did  Gover- 
nor Rebollar  order  the  removal  of  the  muzzle  and  as 
often  did  Velasquez  put  it  on  again."  (i) 

The  evening  of  the  aggression,  the  chief  of  police, 
and  the  police  inspector  and  the  Chief  of  the  Secret 
Police  had  a  confab  with  the  Minister  of  the  Interior, 
with  the  following  result:  On  his  return  to  police 
headquarters  the  chief  of  police  gave  orders  to  his  ser- 
vant to  buy  a  dozen  knives  and  commissioned  the 
police  inspector  to  organize  as  perfect  and  lifelike  an 
imitation  of  a  "lynching"  as  he  could  produce,  with 
Arroyo  as  villain  and  victim.  The  police  inspector  was 
to  be  the  stage  manager,  hero  and  the  avenger  of  this 
real  tragedy,  which  consisted  in  picking  out  seven 
"tigers"  from  the   police  force,  disguising  them  as 

(1)     Historia  del  gran  crimen.     J.  M.  Rabago.     pag.  31. 

67 


"pelados"*,  arm  them  with  the  knives  bought  for  the 
purpose  and  then  leading  them  on  to  an  attack  on 
poHce  headquarters  where  they  were  to  lynch  Arroyo 
and  then,  when  making  their  escape,  to  shout  "Viva 
Mexico"  and  "Down  with  Anarchy." 

While  on  one  side  the  police  were  preparing  the 
stage  setting,  the  government  and  the  minister  of  war 
were  trying  to  devise  a  means  of  destroying  Arroyo  in  a 
legal  and  constitutional  manner.  They  unconsciously 
attempted  to  make  a  case  of  lese-majesty  out  of  it,  but 
the  constitution  naturally  did  not  provide  for  that; 
they  tried  to  insist  that  the  crime,  which  was  not  a 
crime  but  only  an  obortive  attempt,  was  of  a  military 
nature.  Unfortunately  for  this  theory  Arroyo  was  not 
a  military  man;  so  they  discovered  that  when  he  had 
attacked  the  President,  this  one  had  been  arrayed  in 
full  dress  military  uniform;  but  when  on  looking  up 
the  military  code,  it  was  found  that  the  punishment 
for  such  a  crime  was  only  two  years  of  prison,  the 
officious  wiseacres  gave  it  up  in  disgust. 

About  twelve  thirty  the  curtain  of  the  show  was 
raised,  the  seven  policemen  or  "tigers"  masquerading 
as  "pelados"  dashed  smartly  in  an  attack  against  po- 
lice headquarters  and  entered  the  room  of  the  prisoner. 
The  police  on  guard  there  having  been  disarmed  before- 
hand, made  but  a  feeble  resistance  and  desisted  en- 
tirely on  recognizing  some  of  their  colleagues.  Arroyo 
was  sitting  on  a  chair  in  a  straight  jacket,  helpless, 
tmable  to  defend  himself,  and  the  intrepid,  indomitable 
"tigers"  went  at  their  job  like  professional  cut- throats, 
"the  stilettoes"  penetrated  the  stomach,  now  the 
thorax,  again  the  lungs,  mangling  violently,  passion- 
ately, with  incredible  frenzy,  the  body  of  the  victim 
as  it  shook  in  lamentable  impotence,  the  blood  spurting 
from  the  torn  muscles  and  veins,  and  running  on  the 
floor.  Nine  wounds  were  inflicted  on  that  mass  of 
flesh — the  criminals  labored  impatiently,  seeking  only 
the  perfection  of  the  stroke,  the  gross  art  of  assassinat- 

*  Indians  of  the  poorest  class. 

66 


ing,  aiming  at  the  entrails,  according  to  their  rude 
physiological  knowledge.  The  victim  gave  a  piercing 
cry  of  horror,  anguish  and  despair,  a  howl  condensing 
the  force  of  an  existence  losing  itself  in  endless  night. 

The  assassins  had  their  decorative  coquetry,  they 
unfurled  and  fluttered  the  national  flag — shouted 
"Viva  Mexico."  In  this  detail  I  was  not  able  to 
ascertain  if  it  was  an  artistic  improvisation  of  the 
"  matadores"  or  a  thought  of  Velasquez  who  was  invit- 
ing the  complicity  of  the  country,  (i)  Then  they  fled 
shouting  "Down  with  anarchy".  In  police  head- 
quarters Sanchez  fired,  by  order,  a  revolver,  broke 
several  window  panes  so  as  to  attract  the  ciwiosity  of 
the  idlers  and  the  attention  of  the  Chief  of  Police  who 
was  awaiting  this  signal.  The  belated  persons  who 
were  attracted  by  the  noise  were  allowed  to  enter  the 
police  station,  some  of  the  more  timid  were  even 
courteously  invited  to  enter,  and  then  they  were  all 
arrested  as  dangerous  and  suspicious  characters,  as 
authors  and  perpetrators  of  the  crime. 

Very  soon  afterward  the  Minister  of  War,  an 
asthmatic  old  man  was  apparently  taking  fresh  air 
on  his  balcony  in  the  Independencia  street,  when  an 
officer  of  the  police  stopped  under  his  window  and 
said:  " I  come  to  inform  you  from  the  Chief  of  Police, 
that  they  have  already  lynched  Arroyo."  whereupon 
the  General  lifted  his  hand  deprecatingly  and  without 
hesitation  or  astonishment  said:  "I  regret  it  for  the 
honor  of  the  cotmtry." 

In  the  morning  of  the  17  th  the  official  paper 
gave  the  news  of  the  lynching,  informing  he  publict 
that  a  violent  mob  of  men  had  killed  Arroyo  sweeping 
everything  before  it,  that  only  a  few  were  under  arrest, 
strictly  "incomunicados",  and  giving  their  names, 
also  a  description  of  the  weapons  left  in  the  room  by 
the  fleeing  lynchers. 

The  first  impression  produced  by  this  extraordi- 
nary news  was  one  of  terror.     The  story  of  the  lynch- 

(1)     Hittoria  del  gran  crimen.     J.  M.  Rabago.     pag.  45. 


ing  was  a  fable  impossible  of  general  acceptation  and 
produced  only  sardonic  smiles  that  could  be  interpreted 
as  a  lack  of  all  belief  that  the  "people"by  a  strange 
novelty  had  dedicated  itself  to  the  exercise  of  justice, 
(i)  Nobody  credited  this  macaberesque  invention. 
The  President  exclaimed  "it  is  a  pity,  they  have  cut 
the  thread,  and  what  is  worse,  it  is  shameful  for  the 
country."  Also  when  a  commission  of  prominent  per- 
sons congratulated  him  on  his  miraculous  escape  from 
murder  he  said  "What  I  regret,  is  that  we  cannot 
now  claim  that  in  Mexico  they  do  not  lynch."  But 
nobody,  not  even  the  President  believed  that  Arroyo 
had  been  lynched.  The  unofficial  newspapers  derided 
the  fable;  popular  feeling  became  so  intense  and  threat- 
ening, that  impelled  by  this  tremendous  pressure, 
General  Mena  and  J.  Y.  Limantour  called  a  meeting 
of  the  cabinet,  resulting  in  a  demand  for  an  official  in- 
vestigation by  Congress. 

Congress  met,  and  the  justice  of  Mexico  was  notified 
to  bring  to  accotmt  the  authors  of  this  atrocious 
and  illegal  occurrence.  The  police  heads  who  had  or- 
ganized the  outrage  were  shocked  and  surprised  at 
being  constrained  to  enter  the  prison  (Belem)  as  a 
result  of  a  service  to  "high  politics."  The  young 
lawyers  defending  the  guilty  policemen,  argued  that 
all  the  prisoners  with  the  exception  of  one  had  only 
followed  orders  from  their  chief,  as  soldiers  obey  their 
commander.  They  did  excellent  work,  especially  in 
the  cross-examination. 

The  chief  of  police  was  on  the  rack,  he  M^as  ques- 
tioned, cross-questioned,  desperately  trying  to  keep  up 
the  silly  farce  of  the  popular  lynching.  Hopelessly  he 
fought  truth  and  the  evidence  accumulating  against 
him  and  his  flimsy  fairy  tale.  At  last  suspecting  that 
the  invisible  hand  which  had  directed  him  and  the 
influence  on  which  he  had  counted  was  now  powerless 
to  protect  him,  he  divined  that  by  an  irresistible  logic 
of  events  he  would  be  sacrificed  as  the    scapegoat  of 

(1)     Idem.    pag.  56. 

70 


this  tragic  farce  and  realizing  that  the  ground  was 
giving  way  under  him,  he  lost  his  head,  and  trapped, 
cornered  like  a  wild  boar  by  a  pack  of  tenacious  hounds, 
turned  round  to  fight  for  his  last  chance,  the  chance  of 
his  life.  Pale  and  trembling  with  excitement  he  rose 
declaring  that  now  he  would  tell  the  truth,  the  whole 
truth,  but  the  judge  stopped  him  instantly,  with  the 
excuse  of  the  lateness  of  the  hour,  adding  however, 
that  he  could  make  his  declaration  the  day  following. 

The  next  morning  the  news  of  his  "suicide"  was 
published.  Three  days  before,  a  newspaper  had  pub- 
lished the  same  news,  evidently  as  a  tip  that  sooner 
or  later  such  an  occurence  must  take  place.  The  rest 
and  the  seven  "tigers"  were  sentenced  to  death, 
but  later,  on  a  technicality,  the  judgment  was  com- 
muted to  six  years  imprisonment. 

The  inside  history  of  this  plot  is  as  follows.  Two 
generals  high  in  the  army  plotted  a  "  coup  d'  ^tat",  for 
the  purpose  of  installing  themselves  in  power  after  the 
assassination  of  Porfirio  Diaz.  They  had  the  immediate 
power  of  the  coimtry  in  their  hands;  the  army  was 
imder  their  direct  orders  and  the  police  and  the  judges 
of  the  Federal  District  were  subject  to  them  also. 
They  used  the  chief  of  police  as  their  tool,  bribed  with 
the  promise  of  a  governorship,  and  the  former  in  his 
turn  used  Arroyo  for  the  purpose  of  assassinating  the 
President,  though  we  cannot  imagine  what  induce- 
ments or  arguments  the  chief  could  have  employed 
to  convince  Arroyo  and  urge  him  to  commit  such  a 
desperate  and  hopeless  deed.  Furthermore  the  chief 
counted  on  an  Indian,  paid  for  that  purpose,  to  watch 
the  President  during  his  walk  from  the  palace  to  the 
alameda,  with  order  to  kill  any  person  attacking  him.. 
On  the  15th  of  September  Arroyo  got  drunk  in  Atza- 
potzalco;  he  was  arrested,  and  kept  in  jail  overnight. 
Next  day,  Arroyo  still  dazed  by  alcoholic  fumes,  un- 
armed, for  his  revolver  had  been  confiscated,  felt  never- 
theless as  if  hypnotized  by  a  tenacious  will  greater  than 
his  own  that  impelled  him  to  attack  the  President, 

71 


with  the  aforementioned  result.  The  Indian  however 
came  too  late  to  fulfill  his  part  of  the  work,  as  the 
President  suspecting  a  plot  had  interfered  in  time. 
"When  Arroyo  arrived  at  police  headquarters  they  put 
him  immediately  in  a  straight  jacket  and  muzzled  him, 
being  mortally  afraid  that  the  wretched  creature  would 
"  squeal"  and  betray  him  as  well  as  the  "men  higher  up" 
for  the  chief  alone  never  would  have  dared  to  plot 
against  the  life  of  the  President. 

Therefore  the  prompt  elimination  of  Arroyo  was  of 
the  utmost  necessity  and  although  the  President  was 
desirous  that  Arroyo  should  not  die,  the  system  was 
more  powerful  than  his  wishes.  The  lynching  was  the 
hasty  conception  of  excited  and  alarmed  heads,  for  a 
cool  and  calm  reflection  would  have  dismissed  it  as 
absurd.  Evidently  none  of  the  plotters  counted  on  the 
horror  and  indignation  that  such  an  act  would  arouse, 
and  the  result  was  the  trial  and  imprisonment  of  all 
the  lynchers,  as  well  as  of  the  chief  of  police.  That 
the  life  of  this  man  was  doomed  from  the  beginning  is 
proved  by  the  publication  of  his  "alleged"  suicide  in  an 
official  paper,  either  as  a  mistake  or  as  a  warning 
that  such  an  event  might  happen. 
K  After  the  official  paper  had  given  the  false  news 
of  the  "  suicide"  of  the  chief  three  days  before  his 
death,  the  Governor  of  the  federal  district,  ordered 
the  "alcaide",  inspector  of  the  jail  to  start  a  minute 
perquisition  through  the  rooms  and  the  person  of  the 
prisoner,  to  see  if  he  might  not  be  concealing  any 
weapons.  In  spite  of  the  careful  search  however, 
nothing  was  found,  yet  the  morning  after  the  "  suicide" 
near  the  bed  of  the  chief  the  revolver  with  which  he 
was  supposed  to  have  killed  himself  was  strangely 
discovered.  On  the  very  night,  within  an  hour,  within 
five  minutes  of  the  "suicide,"  the  police  inspector  was 
sitting  chatting  with  several  men  in  a  place  in  the 
prison  not  far  distant  from  the  prisoner's  cell,  when 
on  some  trivial  pretext  he  arose  and  left  the  room, 
returning   and   continuing   the   conversation   after   a 

73 


brief  interval.  During  his  absence  *a  pistol  shot  was 
heard  in  the  cell  of  the  chief  of  police — the  shot  that 
ended  the  life  of  the  unarmed  "suicide."  Next  day 
the  story  of  the  "suicide"  was  circulated.  Who  else 
but  a  powerful  man  could  have  forced  a  judge  to  re- 
voke a  death  sentence  and  change  it  to  six  years  im- 
prisonment? 


While  there  might  temporarily  be  state  secrets,  it  is 
impossible  that  there  should  be  national  secrets,  and  the 
only  result  of  a  purely  ofificial  presentation  of  a  country's 
status  is  to  lose  credit  as  a  government  without  helping 
the  country. 

F.   BULNES. 


Justice  Under  Diazpotism. 

Justice  is  the  end  of  government;  it  is  the  end 
of  civil  society.  It  ever  has  been  and  ever 
will  be  pursued  until  it  be  obtained,  or  until 
liberty  be  lost  in  the  pursuit. 

Madison  in  "The  Federalist." 

Mexico  lost  her  liberty  in  the  pursuit  of  justice. 
The  justice  of  Mexico  lies  hidden  within  the  palm  of  a 
political  trickster,  whom  death  must  summon  before 
his  closed  fisc  will  relax  its  fearful  hold  upon  a  crumpled, 
wilted,  and  disfigured  justice. 

The  political  credit  of  a  nation  is  expressed  by  its 
justice,  the  independence  of  its  courts,  the  incorrupti- 
bility of  its  judges.  The  first  questions  a  foreigner  asks 
about  a  nation  will  be  "Are  your  investments  safe?  Is 
personal  liberty  secure?" 

There  are  two  kinds  of  justice  in  Mexico;  one  for 
the  foreigner,  another  for  the  Mexican.  Porfirio  Diaz 
learned  by  experience  that  most  wars  and  foreign  inter- 
ventions in  Mexico,  have  been  brought  about  by  the 
legal  wrongs  and  the  arbitrary  discriminations  against 
foreigners.  Therefore  he  made  it  one  of  his  political 
commandments  to  treat  foreigners  as  gingerly  and 
equitably  as  conditions  might  permit.  The  foreigner 
brings  into  the  country-  either  money  or  energy ;  he  toils 
and  helps  improve  the  economical  conditions  of  the 
land;  he  does  not  interfere  in  politics,  neither  has  he 
any  ambition  outside  of  enriching  himself;  when 
oppressed  or  illtreated,  he  can  always  invite  inter- 
national complications  and  discredit  the  cotmtry  by 
appealing  for  redress  to  his  consul  or  minister;  on  the 
other  hand  to  the  Diaz  regime,  the  native  does  not 
represent  the  same  direct  advantages  to  the  country 
as  the  foreigner;  the  Mexican  loves  to  play  politics  and 
in  this  manner  interferes  with  the  f)ower  and  ambition  of 
the   despot.     Justice   is  essentially  by  nature  demo- 

77 


cratic,  its  verdicts  are  indifferent  to  caste,  birth  influ- 
ence and  wealth;  it  is  therefore  logical  that  that  justice 
in  its  purest  sense  cannot  dwell  in  a  nation  ruled  by  a 
satrap,  since  a  one-man's  rule  is  inherently  of  an  aris- 
tocratic type. 

It  was  the  crafty  and  canny  policy  of  Porfirio 
Diaz  to  offer: — justice,  fair  play  and  special  privileges  to 
the  foreigner;  to  his  henchmen  immunity,  license, 
favors  and  protection;  to  the  independent  native 
arbitrariness,  injustice  and  chicanery. 

Porfirio  Diaz  represents  the  two-faced  Janus: 
the  front  the  face  of  a  Minerva;  serious,  calm,  just,  pro- 
found and  noble ;  that  is  for  the  outsider,  but,  seen  from 
the  back,  for  the  Mexican,  it  is  the  mask  of  a  Medusa ; 
terrible,  racked  by  fear  and  cruelty,  a  horrible  thing  to 
behold  in  its  petrified  violence. 

Porfirio  Diaz  has  a  business  partner,  a  Spaniard, 
who  is  very  rich  and  a  very  shrewd  and  influential 
man;  it  is  a  common  occurence  to  see  the  judges  of  the 
supreme  court  and  of  the  federal  districts  courts  danc- 
ing attendance  on  this  Spaniard  to  discuss  with  him 
the  resolutions  of  judicial  affairs.  These  judges  are  cor- 
rupt in  a  shameless  and  cynical  manner;  those  who  are 
not  corrupt  and  who  try  to  do  their  duty  always  obey 
the  orders  of  all  the  sateUites,  of  the  minister  and  sub- 
secretary  of  justice  and  of  Porfirio  Diaz  whose  merest 
wish  is  a  command.  Take  at  random  from  the  list 
of  the  judges  any  one  and  you  will  get  an  idea  of  the 
type  of  men  dispensing  justice  in  Mexico. 

One  is  a  native  of  Oaxaca.  In  eight  years  as  a 
judge  has  made  a  fortune  of  over  one  million  dollars. 
He  is  now  president  of  the  supreme  court,  has  been  a 
magistrate,  president  of  the  debates  and  agent  for  the 
government.  He  is  a  perfect  type  of  the  courtier, 
lackey  of  the  president.  As  the  administration  favored 
the  suppression  of  the  jury  system,  he  in  an  interview 
gave  out  this  argument  against  the  jury  system, 
claiming  that  no  matter  what  the  jury's  intentions 
were,  he  could  always  induce  it  to  indict  according 

78 


to  his  views.  It  is  a  saying  of  his  that  there  is  no 
other  justice  than  the  royal  wish  of  the  ruler. 

Another,  still  a  young  man.  Not  quite  a  year  ago 
was  tr}^ing  a  murder  case,  when  one  evening  at  a  dinner 
with  friends  he  made  a  bet  with  the  lawyer  of  the  de- 
fence, claiming  that  he  would  condemn  the  accused 
man  to  death.  The  lawyer  took  him  up  and  as  a  guar- 
antee of  good  faith,  asked  for  a  written  statement  of 
the  bet,  which  consisted  in  the  payment  of  a  dinner 
to  the  winner.  A  newspaperman  got  hold  of  the  docu- 
ment and  published  it  with  the  story  of  the  bet.  It 
created  a  great  deal  of  scandal  and  indignation. 
Everybody  expected  to  see  him  dismissed  from 
the  bar.  But  the  imexpected  happened ;  the  lawyer  for 
the  defence  went  to  jail  for  contempt  of  court,  he 
sentenced  the  accused  man  to  death  and  won  his  bet — 
and  he  continues  to  dispense  "  justice"  without  molesta- 
tion or  even  a  reprimand  from  the  minister  of  justice  or 
Porfirio  Diaz.  One  of  his  judicial  axioms  is  that  every 
man  who  is  accused  is  a  criminal  and  should  therefore 
he  condemned. 

Another  has  been  under  indictment  on  eleven 
counts  and  in  his  tribunal  they  have  committed  real 
horrors;  notwithstanding  which  he  always  stays  in 
his  place.  In  1904  his  staff  of  secretaries  was  im- 
prisoned as  they  had  stolen  all  the  fines  of  the  prison- 
ers. The  case  was  dismissed.  Anybody  with  money 
can  fix  his  case  with  the  judge.  He  laughs  cynically 
at  Mexican  justice  and  says  that  it  is  a  "  pamplina'\ 
a  chickiveed,  a  trifle  which  feeds  many  people. 

Another  specimen  of  the  representative  judge  is  an 
ex-law}'er  who  was  sentenced  to  six  years  prison  for 
bigamy.  After  his  term  in  Belem  he  came  out  as 
the  protector  and  defender  of  the  poor.  He  committed 
a  thousand  swindles,  tricks  and  petty  graft  to  such  a 
degree  that  even  the  sleepy  vigilance  committee  had  to 
take  some  action  against  him.  He  was  indicted  on 
several  charges,  but  suddenly  the  case  against  him 
was  dismissed  and   he  was  appointed  secretary  of  a 

79 


tribunal,  judge,   and   government   agent  for  the  war 
department. 

BEI.EM— The  Mexican  Bastii^i^e. 

Where  judges  are  corrupt  one  can  easily  imagine 
what  the  jail  or  expiatory  place  of  justice  must  be. 
Belem,  the  Mexican  Bastille,  is  more  than  purgatory. 
It  is  hell !  It  is  not  described  in  the  books  of  travels  for 
travelers  are  not  allowed  to  visit  this  place  of  torment. 

The  circles  of  Dante's  Inferno  corresponded  to  the 
iniquities  committed  by  the  sinner ;  but  compared  to 
Belem  the  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta  is  a  drawing  room, 
the  Siberian  jails  philanthropic  institutions  and  the 
"piombi"  or  cells  in  the  Doge's  palace  abodes  of 
luxury. 

Belem  is  the  superlative  expression  of  Mexican 
injustice,  it  is  an  example  of  the  equity  of  Porfirio  Diaz, 
the  Just,  the  True,  the  Impartial.  Belem  is  not  a  jail, 
nor  a  galley,  nor  a  prison ;  it  is  Gehenna,  Tophet,  the  pit 
of  Acheron ;  it  is  an  immentionable  disease  on  the  body 
of  Mexican  justice,  a  large  infected  sewer  containing 
vermin,  filth,  carrion,  disease,  pollution  and  depravity; 
filled  with  jail  birds,  packed  like  sardines,  and  treated 
like  cattle.  It  is  an  abomination  on  the  face  of  earth, 
an  human  cess-pool,  a  foul,  malodorous  example  of  the 
benevolent  interest  the  old  despot  takes  in  matters 
hidden  from  the  view  of  strangers. 

The  Diaz  government  has  spent  millions  for  a  park 
and  a  drive  in  Chapultepec,  for  a  model  post  oJBfice,  a 
classic  telegraph  office  and  a  monumental  house  for 
congress,  it  is  spending  from  8  to  lo  million  dollars  for  a 
marble  opera  house,  which  will  be  a  marvel  to  behold. 
But  the  plans  for  a  model  jail  as  suggested  by  W.  de 
Landa  y  Escandon  has  been  rotting  for  the  last  6  years 
in  the  archives  of  the  government! 

Belem  which  is  about  the  size  of  half  a  New  York 
block,  contains,  that  is,  it  is  made  to  contain  anywhere 
between  5,000  to  6,000  men,  besides  300  boys  and  600 

80 


women.  There  is  a  room  i8o  square  yards  where  1800 
men  are  supposed  to  sleep.  They  have  to  fight  so  as  to 
be  able  to  lie  down  to  rest,  the  weaker  must  sit  up  or 
stand  or  lie  on  one  another.  Bugs,  fleas,  lice  of  every 
description  swarm  in  myriads  and  one  flat  blow  of  the 
hand  anywhere  on  the  wall  will  crush  himdreds  of  them. 
The  food  is  unfit  for  consumption,  it  is  left  sometimes 
two  or  three  hours  exposed  to  stm  or  rain  before  it  is 
distributed.  They  permit  the  men  to  have  a  shower 
bath  in  cold  water,  but  they  are  left  to  dry  themselves 
the  best  way  they  can,  for  no  towels  are  given,  nor  even 
soap.  The  result  of  this  state  of  affairs  is  the  great 
number  of  epidemics  and  the  frequency  with  which  the 
inmates  are  afflicted  with  tuberculosis.  On  the  7  th  of 
October  1938  "El  Diario"  published  the  list  of  the 
prisoners  stricken  with  typhoid,  in  one  day:  176  cases. 
Next  day  no  list  could  be  had,  the  truth  was  suppressed 
by  the  authorities.  The  prison  wardens  hold  undisputed 
sway,  they  are  mostly  inmates  of  the  prison;  they  graft, 
rob,  commit  every  kind  of  villanous  deed,  brutalize  and 
sometimes  beat  to  death  the  refractory  prisoners. 

Homo-sexuality  is  rampant  and  is  encouraged  by 
the  wardens;  men  and  boys  are  used  willingly  or  by 
force  for  illicit  intercourse,  alcohol  and  even  mari- 
huana (an  intoxicating  weed),  are  used  to  facilitate 
that  purpose. 

There  is  a  vigilance  committee  composed  of  twelve 
individuals  who  are  supposed  to  see  that  there  are  no 
abuses  and  violations  of  the  law  and  the  rules.  They 
visit  the  prison  once  every  three  or  six  months,  but 
more  often  they  electrify  their  activities,  as  the  coun- 
lic  of  ten  in  Venice,  only  at  the  reception  of  anony- 
mous letters  sent  by  the  prisoners  themselves. 

The  Penitentiary. 

In  spite  of  its  clean  and  healthy  appearance  it  is 
a  place  of  subtle  and  refined  inquisition.  The  prisoners 
are  illtreated,  illfed,  illkept.  In  seven  years  1275 
people  entered  the  penitentiary  and  162  died.     They 

81 


make  the  inmates  work  and  pay  the  men  one-sixteenth 
of  the  pay  of  the  lowest  workingman.  The  wardens 
as  in  Belem  are  all  powerful,  brutal,  unjust.  The  dir- 
ectors of  the  penitentiary  add  months  of  imprisonment 
to  the  sentence  of  the  prisoners  on  the  sole  information 
of  the  wardens.  The  unfortimate  prisoners  have  to  go 
around  almost  naked  if  they  do  not  possess  clothes,  un- 
less they  are  given  to  them  by  charitable  persons. 
Doctors  visit  the  place  every  eight  or  ten  days. 

The  Correctional  Schooi*. 

This  is  called  so  by  mistake,  for  it  is  properly  a 
school  of  vice  and  crimes,  where  minors  serve  their 
terms.  From  there  most  of  the  boys  come  out  full- 
fledged  thieves,  pickpockets,  homo-sexuals,  bullies  and 
even  worse.  They  are  treated  like  animals  and  are 
made  to  work  without  pay  for  the  benefit  of  the 
friends  of  the  administration. 

There  is  a  term  which  you  hear  all  the  time  in 
Mexico  when  a  man  is  sent  to  jail  on  a  criminal  charge 
or  otherwise:  " Incomunicado"  which  means  that  the 
prisoner  is  deprived  of  all  intercourse  with  anyone — 
lawyers,  friends  or  relatives.  It  is  a  powerful  weapon 
in  the  hands  of  the  judges,  or  the  prison  authorities, 
and  in  the  case  of  newspapermen  or  poor  foreigners  who 
would  otherwise  communicate  with  their  representa- 
tives. 

A  certain  Manuel  Batiz  was  left  in  Belem  4  months 
"  incomtmicado"  Juan  Garduno  7  months,  Luis  Torres 
2  years.  Two  years  ago  the  newspapers  published  the 
story  of  the  discovery  of  a  man  who  had  been  in  Belem 
for  20  years,  waiting  as  he  himself  said,  for  an  accusa- 
tion of  some  kind.  The  Czar  Porfirio  Diaz  in  his  infinite 
kindness  pardoned  the  poor  man. 

Here  are  some  examples  of  the  carelessness,  incom- 
petence and  utter  disregard  of  the  first  principles  of 
justice. 

An  inmate  of  the  penitentiary,  16  years  old,  was 

88. 


sentenced,  although  innocent,  with  scarcely  a  hear- 
ing, to  ten  years  imprisonment  for  homicide.  He  pro- 
tested and  asked  for  a  trial  or  a  hearing  as  he  was 
ready  to  prove  his  innocence  and  even  to  indicate  the 
real  name  of  the  murderer.  They  told  him  to  shut  up 
or  he  would  fare  worse. 

Another  was  sentenced  to  death  for  killing  his 
sweetheart.  After  ii  years  of  Belem  the  trial  ended 
and  as  he  had  been  sentenced  to  death  they  commuted 
the  sentence  to  20  years.  But  they  did  not  count 
the  II  years  served,  so  that  in  realty  he  is  serving  31 
years.  When  his  law>'er  spoke  to  the  minister  of 
justice  to  rectify  this  injustice  he  answered  Solomon- 
like: "for  those  who  are  within  the  law,  everything;  for 
those  who  put  themselves  outside  of  the  law,  not  even  air!" 

Another  was  sentenced  to  eight  years  for  man- 
slaughter. When  his  brother  was  caught  3  years  later 
as  an  accomplice,  the  case  was  revised  and  he  was  then 
condemned  to  death.  His  lawyer  went  to  see  the 
minister  of  justice  to  repeal  the  sentence,  as  being  illegal. 
The  minister  replied:  ''Generosity  is  an  attribute  of 
weak  men;  strong  men  always  use  severity!" 

Another  case  was  that  of  a  Frenchman,  45  years 
old,  who  had  drawn  $50,000  on  a  Parisian  bank,  where 
his  note  was  not  honored.  As  the  case  was  a  civil  one 
he  was  discharged  by  the  court  of  jurisdiction.  There- 
upon the  judge  of  the  criminal  court  with  a  stroke  of 
the  pen  sentenced  him  to  9  years  in  prison.  He  was 
transferred  to  the  penitentiary  where  he  was  kept 
rigorously  "  incomunicado"  being  therefore  unable 
either  to  defend  himself  or  to  communicate  with  his 
minister. 

Another,  although  innocent  was  sentenced  to 
12  years  imprisonment.  Later  they  discovered  the 
real  culprit  and  then  he  was  set  at  liberty  with  the 
warning:  "Don't  make  any  scandal,  or  you'll  be  put 
back  in  jail  for  life. 


83 


Department  of  Police  in  Mexico. 

Notwithstanding  the  corruption  surrounding  the 
chief  of  police,  who  is  a  nephew  of  Porfirio  Diaz,  he  is 
the  best  man  in  the  department  and  one  of  the  best 
men  they  ever  had.  He  is  a  quiet  man,  is  unassuming 
and  unostentatious,  and  tries  to  do  what  he  conceives 
his  duty  as  he  conceives  it.  Nevertheless,  he  is  play- 
ing his  little  part  in  politics,  for  FeHx  Diaz  is  a  very 
ambitious  man.  On  the  other  hand  the  department 
of  secret  police  or  better  called  the  department  of 
detectives  or  plain  clothes  men,  is  composed  of  the 
riff-raff,  the  dregs  of  criminal  Mexico;  among  its  mem- 
bers are  professional  murderers  and  thieves. 

The  judges  know  so  well  the  unconditional  protec- 
tion offered  to  them  by  Porfirio  Diaz  that  they  believe 
and  make  the  poor  and  unfortunate  seekers  of  justice 
believe  that  they  are  infallible. 

Here  is  a  case  to  illustrate  my  assertion.  One 
night  some  ticket  speculators  quarreled  with  some  de- 
tectives who  promptly  took  them  to  the  police  station. 
Next  day  they  testified  before  a  Judge  who  inquired 
where  they  had  their  last  drink  before  their  quarrel. 
They  named  a  certain  well-known  restaurant.  The 
judge  without  investigating  whether  the  bar  was 
closed  imposed  a  fine  of  $;^oo  on  the  proprietor  of 
the  restaurant.  This  man  brought  his  witnesses  and 
even  the  policeman  on  the  beat,  who  testified  that  the 
bar  was  closed  and  that  only  the  restaurant  was  open, 
which  was  according  to  law.  The  secretary  for  the  gov- 
ernor of  the  district  was  not  in  the  slightest  degree  im- 
pressed by  this  array  of  evidence,  but  as  the  oracle  of 
the  federal  district  he  declared  "Although  I  know  that 
you  are  right,  it  matters  not,  the  word  of  the  judge  is 
infallible. ' ' 

We  all  know  that  there  is  a  Pope  who  is  infallible  in 
matters  religious,  but  Mexico  had  to  reveal  to  us  infal- 
lible judges. 

Let  us  see  now  how  far  the  infallibility  of  the  judges 

84 


of  the  supreme  court  can  stand  the  strain  when  it  is  a 
question  of  influential  and  fearless  foreigners. 

A  few  years  ago  an  electric  lighting  concern  (a 
Canadian  corporation)  needed  a  piece  of  land  for  the 
installation  of  electric  posts.  The  Mexican  gentlemen 
who  owned  the  land  saw  in  this  a  great  opportunity  to 
hold  up  this  wealthy  corporation.  This  lot  was  almost 
a  parallelogram  and  the  company  needed  for  its  purpose 
only  one  comer,  a  triangle,  about  one  tenth  of  the 
whole.  The  owners  of  the  land  offered  the  whole  lot 
at  say  $x  a  square  meter,  but  the  president  of  the  com- 
pan}'^  declined  to  buy  the  whole,  and  offered  instead  to 
buy  the  comer  at  the  price  stated.  Then  the  afore- 
mentioned gentlemen  very  cunningly  decided  to  sell  the 
triangk,  but  at  a  price  which  would  be  equivalent  to 
that  of  the  whole.  This  the  president  of  the  corpora- 
tion refused  to  accept.  The  case  was  carried  up  to  the 
supreme  court,  which  decided  that  the  owners  of  the 
land  were  in  the  right  to  ask  such  a  price  and  con- 
demned the  lighting  company  to  pay  it. 

The  lawyer  for  the  corporation  came  one  morning 
to  see  its  president  informing  him  that  the  case  has 
been  decided  against  him,  and  that  if  he  did  not  pay 
the  price  agreed  upon,  the  supreme  court  would  con- 
demn the  property  of  the  lighting  company  to  pay  for 
the  settlement  of  the  case.  The  president  of  the  corpo- 
ration answered  that  he  did  not  care  what  the  supreme 
court  might  do,  as  the  case  was  a  flagrant  violation  of  the 
law,  and  that  if  the  condemnation  should  take  place 
the  press  of  Europe  and  of  America  would  publish  this 
news  as  a  specimen  of  Mexican  justice.  The  fright- 
ened lawyer  went  post-haste  to  Mr.  Limantour  who  real- 
izing the  international  importance  of  the  case  in- 
formed Porfirio  Diaz  about  it. 

The  president  had  a  hurried  meeting  with  the 
judges  of  the  supreme  court  and  the  result  was  a  rever- 
sal of  the  case  to  the  original  equitable  basis. 

Moral:  If  you  are  at  the  head  of  a  rich  corpora- 
tion in  Mexico,  even  the  supreme  court  will  reverse  its 

85 


judgments,  but  if  you  are  only  an  insignificant  restaurant 
keeper,  an  unjust  sentence  will  be  called  infallible. 

Here  is  another  incident  illustrating  how  the  poli- 
tical camarilla  in  Mexico  can  and  does  sometimes  get 
out  of  the  control  of  the  iron  hand  of  the  Czar. 

The  same  corporation,  noticed  that  they  were  losing 
enormous  quantities  of  electric  power.  After  careful 
investigation  they  discovered  that  the  leak  happened 
near  a  mill  operated  in  the  outskirts  of  Mexico  City. 
They  tapped  and  measured  the  power  at  the  pole  near- 
est to  the  mill  and  after  having  figured  out,  they  found 
that  although  the  mill  was  lighted  and  run  by  electricity 
the  manager  only  paid  for  a  fraction  of  the  power, 
which  loss  to  the  corporation  amounted  to  $45,000.  The 
president  of  the  corporation  made  his  accusation  to  a 
judge  and  sent  out  a  warrant  for  the  arrest  of  the 
manager  of  the  mill.  Next  morning  some  Mexican 
gentlemen  prominent  in  the  finances  and  politics  came 
to  see  the  president  of  the  corporation  begging  him  to 
stop  proceedings  against  the  mill  manager  as  a  favor  to 
Gen.  Diaz,  adding  that  they  were  willing  to  pay  the  full 
amount  of  the  losses  incurred  by  the  corporation.  The 
president  of  the  company  accepted  the  settlement  and 
forthwith  went  to  the  judge  who  had  taken  up  his  case 
asking  him  to  drop  it.  The  judge  became  arrogant  and 
refused  to  do  this,  accordingly  the  president  began 
making  his  accusation,  naming  all  the  directors  and 
owners  of  the  mill  interested  in  the  affair.  When  the 
judge  heard  the  names  of  the  influential  and  promi- 
nent men  implicated  in  the  process,  and  realized  the 
importance  of  the  whole  business,  he  refused  to  go  on 
with  the  case.  Then  the  president  became  angry  at 
this  ignorant  and  foolish  judge,  he  threatened  to  go 
after  him  if  he  did  not  do  his  duty,  whereupon  the 
judge  reluctantly  resumed  the  case.  Next  morning 
there  appeared  in  the  company's  office,  togged  up  in 
the  full  imiform  of  aide-de-camp,  the  royal  valet  to 
the  president,  who  informed  the  president  of  the  light- 
ing company  that  the  president  wanted  him  to  know 

86 


that  the  emisary  of  the  President  was  lying  when  he 
asked  for  leniency  in  the  president's  name  in  the 
case  of  the  tapping  of  the  power  of  the  mill.  That  it 
would  be  agreeable  to  the  president  if  the  company 
should  continue  the  proceedings  against  the  mill  direc- 
tors or  owners. 

The  manager  and  assistant  manager  of  the  mill 
were  sentenced  to  Belem,  the  directors  who  knew  about 
the  whole  affair  and  were  directly  responsible  for  it 
went  scot-free.  A  year  after  the  sentence  the  widow  of 
the  manager  of  the  mill  came  to  see  the  president  of 
the  lighting  company,  saying  that  her  husband  had 
died  in  jail  and  begged  for  money  to  pay  for  the  funeral 
expenses  and  for  her  trip  home  back  to  Spain.  The 
president  paid  for  the  funeral  expenses  and  for  the 
trip  to  Spain.  Imagine  his  discomfiture  when  he  dis- 
covered later  that  the  manager  of  the  mill  had  not 
died,  but  was  in  Spain  healthy  as  may  be  and  that  he 
had  paid  for  the  funeral  expenses  of  a  dummy  who  had 
been  impersonating  the  mill  manager  through  the 
political  influence  of  the  mill  owners  and  directors. 

Ley  Fuga.    (Runaway  Law.) 

The  "Ley  Fuga"  or  Runaway  Law  is  no  law  at  all 
but  a  Mexican  euphonism.  It  has  been  in  practice 
the  last  two  or  three  generations.  Bandits  infected  the 
country  like  a  plague,  so  when  they  were  caught  and 
conducted  from  one  place  to  another  on  trial,  they 
usually  tried  to  escape  and  then  they  were  shot. 
This  natural  impulse  to  run  away  was  cleverly  used 
by  the  governors,  jefes  politicos,  etc.,  to  get  rid  of  their 
enemies.  For  instance  a  prominent  rancher  or  influen- 
tial person  wanted  to  get  rid  of  an  enemy  or  the  lover 
of  a  girl  on  whom  they  had  cast  their  lustful  eyes,  then 
they  would  simply  accuse  the  unfortunate  man  of  some 
imaginary  criminal  offence.  The  accused  was  on  some 
pretext  or  other  taken  from  one  prison  to  another 
from  village  to  village.     On   the  way,  the  rurales  or 

87 


country  police  would  let  him  go  ahead  and  then 
shoot  him  in  the  back.  On  their  return  to  the  village 
they  would  declare  that  the  prisoner  had  tried  to 
escape  and  that  he  had  been  shot  in  the  attempt.  If 
they  had  to  appear  before  a  judge  they  would  describe 
how  the  prisoner  had  attacked  them,  shot  at  them  and 
while  running  away  had  been  killed.  To  prove  their 
assertion  they  brought  forward  a  grey  hat  perforated 
by  a  bullet  hole  and  a  saddle  with  the  same  perforation, 
according  to  testimony.  The  strange  part  of  the  affair 
is  that  the  same  grey  hat  and  the  same  saddle  are  used 
over  and  over  again  in  each  case  of  the  kind. 

Originally  the  "Ley  Fuga"  was  an  imsuccessful 
attempt  to  get  rid  of  the  bandits  Porfirio  Diaz  got  rid 
of  them  by  either  having  them  shot  on  the  spot  or  by 
offering  them  better  pay  to  enter  the  government  ser- 
vice as  rurales.  This  way  he  gathered  an  excellent 
corps  of  men,  inured  to  all  kinds  of  fatigue  and  strenu- 
ous work  and  who  kept  the  country  in  order.  Porfirio 
Diaz  believed  in  the  old  adage  that  it  takes  a  thief  to 
catch  a  thief. 

There  are  no  more  bandits  in  Mexico,  but  the  "  Ley 
Fuga"  is  still  in  full  vigor;  it  is  used  for  private  ven- 
geance, for  political  purposes  and  is  one  of  the  most 
dangerous,  cowardly  and  execrable  weapons  used  by 
Diaz  and  his  political  mafia. 

QUINTANA  ROO,  THE   MEXICAN   SIBERIA. 

Despotic  Mexico  without  its  Siberia  would  not  be 
complete  or  perfect  as  a  political  machine.  But  the 
brain  of  Porfirio  Diaz  ever  fertile  in  expedients  and  loop- 
holes found  a  good  excuse  in  the  Maya  rebellions  in 
Yucatan  to  cut  about  half  of  the  state  to  make  it  a 
federal  district,  so  as  to  be  able  to  keep  there  con- 
stantly a  few  thousand  soldiers.  The  Valle  nacional  is 
used  as  the  Russians  use  Siberia  to  send  their  political 
prisoners,  with  this  difference;  that  many  prisoners 
escape  from  Siberia  to  tell  the  tale,  but  no  one  sent  to 

88 


Yucatan  for  a  few  years  has  ever  come  back.  It  is  the 
most  unhealthy,  marshy,  feverish,  and  pestiferous  spot  in 
Mexico.  The  chances  against  the  prisoners  are  greater 
than  against  the  roulette  wheel,  with  the  two  O's  and 
the  eagle.  If  the  execrable  food  does  not  kill  you, 
either  a  sun  stroke,  yellow  fever  or  some  other  dreadful 
tropical  disease  will  do  it.  Should  you,  as  a  prisoner  be 
tough  or  lucky  enough  to  survive,  they  apply  another 
form  of  the  ley  fuga  to  you.  The  officer  or  sergeant  in 
charge  of  the  soldiers  will  make  friends  with  you,  and 
suggest  a  very  easy  way  of  escaping;  if  you  are  inno- 
cent or  anxious  enough  to  do  so,  the  soldiers  who  are 
always  watching  you,  have  orders  to  shoot  you,  even 
if  you  should  leave  the  rank  and  file  to  get  a  drmk  at 
a  nearby  fountain.  If  all  the  coaxing  is  unavailable,  then 
you  are  offered  the  means  of  committing  suicide,  but 
should  you  refuse  this  kindness,  then  they  help  you  to 
kill  yourself,  or  in  plain  English  they  assassinate  you 
without  more  ado,  for  a  doomed  man  who  will  not  take 
a  diplomatic  hint,  ought  to  be  killed  like  a  mere  dog. 

In  1904  a  young  man  named  Palomar  Serrano, 
aged  20  years, during  the  convention  of  the  "Liberal 
Jacobines"who  were  celebrating  the  anniversar}'-  of  the 
death  of  Juarez  at  the  Arbeu  Theatre,  got  up  and  said : 
"  I  come  to  indict  the  great  criminal  Porfirio  Diaz."  He 
had  no  time  to  say  another  word,  as  he  was  arrested  by 
order  of  the  chief  of  police,  next  day,  without  any  trial 
he  AMas  sent  to  Yucatan  for  three  years. 

Here  is  another  example  of  justice  which  reminds 
one  of  the  12th  century  justice  in  the  Italian  principali- 
ties. 

A  well  known  general,  who  lives  in  Mexico,  had, 
as  they  say,  a  misfortune  in  the  family;  his  daughter 
had  eloped  with  the  family  coachman.  The  daughter 
was  sent  back  home  and  later  married  a  very  respec- 
table officer.  But  the  ambitious  coachman  was  sent  to 
Yucatan — where  his  bones  are  now  rotting  in  the  torrid 
sun  of  Quintana  Roo. 

When  a  man  of  talent  or  of  a  certain  political  influ- 

89 


ence  has  attacked  Porfirio  Diaz  or  the  administration  in 
articles  or  speeches,  and  he  cannot  be  punished  by  the 
ley  fuga  or  exiled  to  Yucatan,  they  resort  to  several 
underhand  ways  to  discredit  him. 

Newspapermen  are  often  arrested  in  the  midst  of 
the  night,  without  a  warrant  or  an  order  from  a  judge, 
just  on  the  invitation  of  a  police  officer  or  a  policeman. 
The  wife  of  a  journalist  was  without  news  from  her 
husband  for  over  a  fortnight,  until  she  appealed  to  the 
director  of  El  Diario  for  information. 

A  well  known  author  and  lawyer  was  writing  a 
book  on  the  actual  political  situation  in  Mexico.  As 
soon  as  this  was  known  to  the  authorities  they  accused 
him  of  contempt  of  court.  The  case  was  not  decided 
either  way,  but  was  kept  pending  over  the  author's 
head  like  a  sword  of  Damocles. 

As  soon  as  the  book  was  published  and  it  was  seen 
that  several  prominent  men  in  politics  were  attacked  in 
it,  the  case  of  contempt  of  court  was  fished  out  and  the 
man  was  indicted. 

It  is  a  frequent  happening  in  Mexico  to  see  a  man 
enter  Belem  on  a  trumped  up  charge  and  stay  there  a 
year  or  longer.  During  this  time  the  rumor  is  circu- 
lated that  the  man  has  either  stolen  money  or  has  com- 
mitted some  criminal  deed.  After  a  certain  time  the 
person  in  question  is  brought  before  a  judge  and  the 
case  dismissed  for  want  of  proofs,  but  the  man  is  dis- 
credited and  ruined  for  life  without  appeal  or  redress 
of  any  kind.  A  year  ago  at  a  vaudeville  show  an  actor 
impersonating  a  monkey,  playfully  put  on  his  head  a 
cap  of  a  policeman  standing  nearby.  He  was  arrested, 
kept  in  jail  all  day  and  fined  $io.  When  they  asked 
the  chief  of  police  the  reason  for  this  severity  he 
retorted:  "that  the  aforesaid  action  was  derogator>^  to 
the  dignity  of  the  police." 

We  shall  see  that  the  word  "derogatory"  is  only 
a  felicitous  rhetorical  figure  by  the  chief  of  police. 
I  shall  mention  two  incidents  which  prove  that 
when  the  offenders  are  influential  men,  this  most  honor- 

90 


able  police  "derogates"  and  pockets  the  insults,  as  in 
the  Mikado. 

A  year  ago  the  son  of  the  minister  of  justice 
slapped  and  insulted  the  chief  of  the  secret  police  for 
giving  out  a  stor\^  of  an  amateur  bull  fight  in  honor 
of  some  prostitutes.  He  was  not  arrested  nor  fined 
nor  even  reprimanded. 

Two  years  ago  the  son  of  a  millionaire  valet  to 
Porfirio  Diaz,  insulted,  slapped  and  kicked  a  policeman 
who  had  dared  order  him  out  of  a  cafe  after  the 
closing  hour.  At  the  police  station  as  soon  as  he 
was  identified  he  was  released  immediately.  Next  day 
his  father,  who  claims  to  despise  all  newspapers,  came 
to  the  ofiice  of  El  Diario  and  begged  the  director  as 
a  favor  not  to  give  any  further  notoriety  to  the  case,  as, 
he  said  "  I  have  sent  my  son  for  a  year  to  Paris,  as  a 
punishment.''     Why  nottoBelem.? 

A  few  months  later  a  young  man,  unfortunate 
because  his  father  was  not  a  royal  valet,  com- 
mitted the  same  offence  against  another  policeman. 
He  was  not  sent  to  Paris — but  to  Belem  for  two  years. 
Thus  they  mete  out  justice  in  Mexico,  the  land  of  con- 
tradictions. 

After  thirty  years  of  the  corrupting,  nefarious, 
harmful  and  secretive  work  of  the  government  on  the 
one  hand  and  on  the  other  of  the  official  and  unofficial 
publicity  of  the  wonderful  progress  of  Mexico,  Por- 
firio Diaz  felt  that  the  time  had  arrived  when  the 
the  Mexican  nation  deserved  the  same  standing  as 
foreign  nations.  He  thought  also,  that  the  faith  in 
the  ability  and  honorability  of  the  administration 
of  Porfirio  Diaz  should  be  given  a  sort  of  vote 
of  confidence  by  foreigners  in  the  matter  of  incor- 
poration of  large  mining,  agricultural  and  land  com- 
panies ;  foreign  nations  having  shown  their  respect  and 
their  admiration  toward  Porfirio  Diaz  by  showering 
medals  and  orders  on  him  and  on  his  family.  Unfor- 
tunately the  foreign  investor  is  more  careful  of  his  con- 

«1 


fidence  and  money  than  foreign  nations,  so  that  when 
Porfirio  Diaz  used  his  Minister  of  Fomento  to  initiate 
a  so-called  mining  law, the  full,  sincere  and  almost  frank 
opinion  of  the  foreign  investor  came  back  to  the  old 
despot  as  a  surprise  and  as  a  keen  disappointment. 

This  famous  so-called  mining  law,  was  initiated 
ostensibly  for  the  purpose  of  preventing  foreigners  from 
acquiring  mining  property  in  Mexico;  but  in  reality  to 
force  them  to  incorporate  their  companies,  not  as  they 
do  now  under  the  laws  of  the  United  States,  England, 
France,  Germany,  etc,  but  under  Mexican  laws  and 
under  the  jurisdiction  of  Mexican  courts.  A  flood  of 
protests  came  from  all  over  the  world  and  also  threats 
that  no  more  capital  would  be  invested  in  Mexico  under 
this  law.  This  stopped  the  propaganda  of  the  law 
which  was  finally  killed,  the  Minister  of  Fomento 
taking  all  the  odium  for  this  initiative  upon  his 
shoulders. 

The  foreign  investor  argued  thus :  We  are  willing 
to  invest  our  millions  in  Mexico  for  our  benefit  and 
for  the  benefit  of  that  country,  but  we  will  not  take 
any  risks  or  chances  at  the  hands  of  Mexican  justice  as 
it  now  exists.  Porfirio  Diaz  might  be  favorable  and 
equitable  toward  foreigners  and  foreign  investments, 
but  a  government  which  relies  on  one  man  for  its  justice 
is  not  a  stable  government.  What  if  Porfirio  Diaz 
should  die  and  his  system  should  continue?  Who  could 
guarantee  the  honorability,  equity  and  friendliness  of 
his  successor  toward  foreigners  and  foreign  capital? 


92 


Martyrdom  is  never  barren,  because  every  man  sees 
on  the  martyr's  brow  a  line  of  his  own  duty. 

Mazzini. 


The  Press  in  Mexico. 

A  free  press  is  the  detective  of  a  nation. 

The  press  of  Mexic )  had  to  comedown  to  the  level  of 
the  Diaz  government  and  with  three  exceptions,  "La 
Opinion"  of  Vera-Cruz,  "La  Re  vista  de  Merida"  in 
Merida,  and  El  Diario  del  Hogar,  Mexico,  D.  F.,  all 
the  newspapers  are  in  the  pay  of  the  government  or  of 
the  governors,  and  if  they  are  hostile  to  the  government 
it  is  because  they  belong  to  the  conservative  or  clerical 
party,  which,  in  spite  of  the  opinion  of  many  Mexicans, 
is  still  a  very  powerful  and  dangerous  element. 

Up  to  the  first  term  of  Porfirio  Diaz  there  was  a  free 
press.  Even  the  constitution  of  1824  in  article  31, 
allowed  the  publication  of  political  opinions.  The  con- 
stitution of  1857  said  in  article  7 — "the  press  must  re- 
spect public  life,  morality  and  public  peace.  Trans- 
gression of  the  law  by  the  press  shall  be  judged  by  two  jur- 
tes,  one  to  determine  the  guilt,  and  another  which  shall 
apply  the  law  and  indicate  the  penalty." 

In  this  manner  those  who  framed  the  law  had  fully 
protected  the  press  with  two  juries  independent  of  each 
other. 

The  Gonzalez  administration  reformed  article  7, 
precisely  in  the  clause  which  the  lawmakers  had  so  care- 
fully provided  for  the  protection  of  the  press.  This 
clause  which  I  have  underlined  above,  was  reformed 
thus:  "The  crimes  committed  by  the  press,  shall  be 
judged  by  competent  tribunals  of  the  federation,  or  of  the 
states,  of  the  federal  district  and  the  territory  of  Lower 
California,  according  to  their  special  legislation." 

Just  the  little  change,  that  the  tribunals,  or,  better 
said,  a  judge  instead  of  two  juries  shall  decide.  It 
looks  like  a  trifle,  but  it  was  of  the  utmost  importance 
for  the  administration  to  have  to  deal  with  their  own 

H 


corrupt  judges  whom  they  could  command  at  will,  in- 
stead of  two  juries  who  might  disagree  or  become  m- 
dependent. 

"Since  1884  the  free  press  has  been  abolished  and 
newspapermen  have  suffered  all  possible  and  imaginable 
vexations — everything  even  censorship  would  be  pre- 
ferable to  the  actual  state,  where  one  does  not  know 
when  and  how  one  transgresses  the  law."  (i) 

The  same  writer  goes  on  to  say:" But  in  Mexico 
where  everything  is  abnormal,  there  does  not  exist  a 
law  applicable  to  the  press.     The  government  preferred 
not  to  legislate  about  it  so  as  to  be  able  to  oppress  all 
the  better."  (2) 

While  there  is  no  law  in  Mexico  against  the  of- 
fences of  the  press,  every  such  transgression  can  be  put 
do\\Ti  under  the  title:  "Crimes  against  reputation." 
of  the  penal  code,  third  book,  chapter  one.  "  Injury- 
Defamation — Extra  judicial  calumny."  Article  642. 
" Defamation  consists:  in  communicating  deceitfully  to 
one  or  more  persons,  the  imputation  of  a  true  or  false 
act,  determined  or  undetermined,  which  might  dishonor 
or  discredit  or  expose  to  contempt  the  person  referred 
to." 

In  this  manner,  everything  from  a  newspaper 
article  to  a  telephone  message,  a  sign  or  even  a  "hier- 
oglyphic" (sic),  is  liable  to  be  considered  an  act  of  de- 
famation. In  the  United  States  and  in  other  civilized 
countries,  you  are  not  guilty  under  the  libel  laws  if  you 
can  prove  your  imputation.  But  in  Mexico  if  you 
accuse  a  public  or  private  person,  for  example,  of  thiev- 
ing and  can  prove  it,  you  go  to  jail  all  the  same.  A  few 
years  ago  it  happened  that  a  newspaperman  accused  a 
government  official  of  embezzlement  and  actually 
proved  the  charge.  The  official  a  well  known  general, 
was  dismissed  from  his  post,  but  the  newspaperman 
went  to  jail  for  three  months. 

In  most  of  the  states  the  governors  have  enacted 


(1)  Una  Campana  Politica,  Pag.   105. 

(2)  Una  Campana  Politica.  Pag.  109. 

96 


special  laws  for  the  sake  of  muzzling,  suppressing  and 
extirpating  the  press.  Under  the  title  of  crimes 
against  reputation  IX.  the  penal  code  of  Yucatan  says 
that,  "in  the  offences  against  the  state;  to  prosecute,  it 
is  not  necessary  that  the  slandered  person  should  have 
been  mentioned  by  its  full  name,  it  is  sufficient  to  indi- 
cate the  initials,  or  an  incorrect  and  disfigured  allusion 
of  the  name,  or  by  certain  suggestions  of  time,  place, 
profession,  maimer,  characteristic  signs,  etc." 

In  the  case  of  any  infraction  of  the  law,  by  a  news- 
paper article,  everybody  from  the  proprietor,  manager 
or  city  editor,  down  to  the  office  boy,  often  even  the 
newsboys,  all  are  sent  in  a  body  to  jail,  and  the  type, 
machinery,  all  the  paraphenalia  is  dumped  into  the 
street.  This  has  happened  innumerable  times,  not  only 
in  every  state  of  Mexico  but  also  in  the  federal  district. 
Sometimes  the  newspaper  editor  and  publisher,  as  in 
Mexico  generally  the  manager  is  both  publisher  and 
editor,  is  advised  to  skip  the  city  or  the  country,  oftener 
he  does  not  receive  any  warning  and  then  the  whole 
staff  goes  to  jail.  In  Belem  there  is  a  hole  called  the 
"editors  cell"  which  is  almost  always  inhabited  by 
journalists  under  accusations. 

I  once  saw  in  Belem  one  of  these  martyrs,  walking 
about  in  his  full  dress  suit  he  had  been  wearing  when 
arrested,  and  he  had  been  in  prison  for  three  whole 
weeks  in  that  most  inappropriate  costume.  Some  of 
the  most  irrepressible  newspapermen  continue  doing 
their  work  even  in  jail,  with  pen  as  well  as  with  pencil. 
Not  satisfied  with  enacting  all  sorts  of  vexatious  laws 
against  them,  Porfirio  Diaz  uses  his  henchmen  to  per- 
secute and  hound  newspapermen,  after  which  he  will 
ostentatiously  and  magnanimously  give  orders  to  re- 
lease them,  then  offer  them  money  or  places  in  the  gov- 
ernment, as  congressmen  or  senators.  Years  ago  he 
founded  an  official  paper  paying  for  the  machinery, 
type,  the  building  and  even  for  the  paper.  To  kill 
all  competition  the  price  charged  for  this  journal  was 
one  Mexican  cent,  or  half  cent  in  American  money  and 

97 


consequently  its  circulation  became  larger  than  that 
of  all  the  other  papers  combined. 

Not  content  with  this,  Porfirio  Diaz  created  a  mon- 
opoly of  the  manufacture  of  paper  in  Mexico,  by  put- 
ting up  a  high  tariff  on  this  product.  As  a  result,  the 
price  of  paper  in  Mexico  is  nearly  three  times  as  much 
as  in  the  United  States  and  is  of  very  inferior  quality. 
This  monopoly  is  in  the  hands  of  the  government 
"camarilla"  which  practically  dictates  to  the  news- 
papers in  Mexico.  It  is  easy  for  them  to  kill  a  news- 
paper; all  they  have  to  say,  is  that  they  are  very  sorry, 
but  cannot  furnish  you  with  paper  on  a  certain  day,  and 
that  is  usually  the  end  of  the  publication. 

To  this  arbiter  of  the  press,  representative  of  the 
official  press  in  Mexico,  this  ambassador  of  the  press 
for  Porfirio  Diaz,  has  been  given  this  enormous  power, 
on  condition  that  he  should  kill  all  competition,  that  is 
to  say,  all  the  anti-administration  papers.  With  un- 
limited money  at  his  disposal  (the  president  himself 
confessing  to  have  spent  for  the  paper  over  one  million 
dollars  in  ten  years),  with  the  protection  of  the  czar, 
and  immunity  as  a  congressman,  the  editor  of  this 
paper  disposed   of   his   rivals. 

About  two  and  a  half  years  ago,  El  Diario,  an  inde- 
pendent newspaper  was  started.  The  people  of  Mexico 
hailed  it  with  delight,  as  a  new  Messiah ;  they  reasoned 
that  the  founders  and  directors  of  the  company  being 
foreigners  it  would  give  the  newspaper  an  immunity 
unknown  to  the  Mexican  press. 

Mr.  Hi  jar  y  Haro,who  is  now  director  of  this  paper, 
who  had  been  one  of  the  secretaries  of  President  Diaz 
and  later  a  paymaster  in  the  army,  is  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  men  in  Mexico.  Utterly  void  of  all  of  the 
passions  characteristic  of  the  Latins,  Mr.  Hijar  seems 
more  like  an  Anglo-Saxon,  calm,  dispassionate,  ever 
patient  and  ready  to  do  justice,  unbiased,  without 
prejudices  or  meanness  of  any  kind;  his  only  flaw  is  his 
unconditional  admiration  of  Porfirio  Diaz.  I  can  ex- 
plain this  adoration  only  by  his  utter  ignorance  of  the 

98 


political  history  of  the  president,  as  Hi  jar  has  passed 
all  his  life  in  Italy  where  his  father  was  in  the  diplomatic 
service. 

Hijar  ran  the  paper  as  nearly  as  Jesus  Christ  would 
have  done  it,  with  this  distinction,  that  the  Saviour  once 
got  angry  and  drove  the  merchants  out  of  the  sanctuary. 
Hijar  never  got  angry  and  did  not  attempt  to  drive  the 
thieves  from  the  temple  of  justice.  Nevertheless  under 
this  man's  guidance,  the  paper  acquired  circulation  and 
a  certain  prestige,  but  lost  its  independence  and  became 
a  neutral,  colorless  news  sheet. 

The  founder  of  El  Diario,  an  Italian  and  ex-cub 
reporter  of  the  New  York  Press  is  quite  as  interesting 
a  type.  Clever,  assimilative,  hard  working,  good  look- 
ing to  a  fault,  fascinating  to  men  as  well  as  women, 
this  individual  possesses  many  characteristics  of  both 
the  Neapolitans  and  the  Mexicans;  he  is  diplomatic,  with 
a  bold  front,  but  at  the  bottom  of  his  heart  as  slippery 
and  timid  as  an  eel,  superficial  as  a  tenor,  with  a 
womanly  intuition  akin  to  talent,  he  has  but  a  poor 
knowledge  of  men  and  human  nature  and  is  petty  in 
his  loves  and  hates.  He  started  on  a  pittance  and  then 
hypnotized  an  American  banker  to  finance  El  Diario. 

In  less  than  two  years  El  Diario  has  spent  over 
$650,000,  it  is  now  paying  expenses.  But  at  the  begin- 
ning this  paper  had  to  weather  all  kinds  of  storms. 

The  hardest  blow  to  El  Diario  came  from  the  official 
press,  which  did  its  best  to  kill  it  at  its  inception.  An 
early  director  of  the  El  Diario  had  bribed  an  em- 
ployee of  the  telegraph  office  to  furnish  our  paper  with 
the  despatches  from  Guatemala,  which  the  minister  of 
foreign  affairs,  Ignacio  Mariscal, refused  to  communicate 
to  us. 

When  Ignacio  Mariscal  saw  the  telegrams  from  the 
Mexican  minister  in  Guatemala  published  in  our  paper 
before  he  had  even  opened  them,  first  he  marveled, 
and  then  began  to  institute  proceedings  against  the 
director  of  El  Diario  for  purloining  and  divulging  state 
secrets.     The  director  being  a  congressman,  had  to  be 

99 


tried  by  his  peers,  that  is  to  say  congress.  The  case,  as 
customary  was  kept  pending  for  several  months,  dur- 
ing which  our  advertisers,  expecting  this  to  be  the 
death  of  El  Diario,  refused  to  renew  their  contracts, 
but  when  it  was  known  that  Elihu  Root  was  to 
visit  the  country,  on  the  day  of  his  arrival  in  the  capital 
a  spectacle  was  arranged  by  Porfirio  Diaz,  to  show 
this  representative  of  the  United  States  with  what 
justice,  tempered  with  mercy,  journalists  were  treated 
in  Mexico.  The  farce  was  exceedingly  well  played; 
congress  met,  and  the  committee  of  congressmen  who 
were  to  pass  judgment  on  the  case,  declared,  that  there 
being  no  secrets  in  a  republic  there  could  be  no  state 
secrets  and  therefore  no  accusation;  and  the  director 
was  absolved  by  imanimous  vote. 

Later  when  El  Diario  started  printing  facts  about 
a  sensational  failure,  there  was  a  hurried  summons  for 
our  director  Hijar  y  Haro  to  go  to  the  office  of  the 
minister  of  finances  J.  Y.  Limantour,  who  very  politely 
but  firmly  begged  him  to  desist  from  "insinuations" 
in  the  affair,  promising  that  the  court  would  bring 
the  culprits  to  the  bar  where  they  would  be  dealt  with 
according  to  law.  But  everybody,  even  the  last  cub- 
reporter  on  El  Diario  knew  that  the  culprit  who  had 
robbed  and  failed  for  millions,  was  in  hiding  at  the 
hacienda  of  a  partner  of  Porfirio  Diaz;  everybody 
knew  that  the  publication  of  the  truth  about  the  affair 
would  involve  the  camarilla  of  President  Diaz  and 
Limantour  in  another  small  Panama  scandal  and  that 
the  guilty  man  was  not  to  be  and  never  would  be 
brought  to  justice,  and  the  courts  have  never  touched 
and  never  will  touch  this  ticklish  matter  in  spite  of 
Limantour's  promises. 

A  short  but  polite  note  to  the  director  of  our  paper 
from  the  secretary  of  the  president,  always  did  the  trick, 
stopping  our  best  stories  We  knew  quite  well  that 
the  exquisitely  polite  request  from  the  secretary  of  the 
president  was  almost  an  order  and  equivalent  to  the 
pencil  of  the  censor. 

UK) 


When  a  certain  Spaniard,  keen,  unscrupulous 
a  typical  financial  bandit,  was  arrested  on  the  charge 
of  embezzlement,  we  received  a  visit  from  the  man- 
ager of  the  San  Rafael  paper  monopoly,  and  were 
asked  not  to  publish  the  news  of  the  arrest,  and  the 
Diario  complied,  feeling  that  this  request  was  prac- 
tically a  threat. 

When  El  Diario  thought  of  publishing,  as  a  matter 
of  news,  the  names  of  the  gilded  youths,  sons  of  the 
most  influential  men  in  Mexico,  with  the  story  of  a  bull 
fight  they  had  held  in  honor  of  some  low  strumpets, 
with  the  official  assistance  of  the  soldiers,  police,  and 
firemen,  these  youngsters  headed  by  the  son  of  the 
minister  of  justice  and  another  man,  millionaire  and 
amateur  bull  fighter,  brought  pressure  on  the  manage- 
ment of  the  paper  monopoly  to  cut  off  our  supply  of 
paper  in  the  event  of  our  publishing  the  story. 

Once  when  El  Diario  published  an  account  of  an 
outrageous  and  arbitrary  imprisonment  of  all  the 
people  at  a  dance  even  to  the  musicians  of  the  orchestra ; 
the  chief  of  police  called  our  director  to  his  office  asking 
him  if  we  had  any  grudge  against  him ! 

Any  attack  on  any  government  department  or  any 
official  is  taken  as  a  personal  insult,  and  very  often  a 
duel  follows. 

When  El  Diario  published  a  criticism  of  a  work  of 
the  minister  of  education  Manuel  Sierra,  one  of  his  secre- 
taries came  to  the  office  asking  how  we  dared  criticize 
his  Honor  the  minister ! 

As  soon  as  the  President  places  a  governor  or  any 
man  in  a  government  position,  these  men  seem  to  think 
that  they  are  there  by  the  grace  of  God  and  do  not 
brook  the  slightest  criticism,  no  matter  how  just. 

Honest  men  have  claimed  that  in  a  government 
the  officials  must  live  as  in  a  house  of  crystal;  the  Mexican 
government  officials  know  that  they  are  living  in  glass 
houses  and  they  demand  therefore  that  none  should 
throw  stones  at  them.  All  you  can  do  is  to  throw 
bouquets  at  them;  they  accept  all  compliments,  all  the 

101 


flatteries,  no  matter  how  fulsome  and  coarse,  and  gush 
over  them  Hke  old  maids  when  complimented  on  their 
wilted  charms. 

If  El  Diario  had  accepted  all  the  money  offered  for 
stopping  the  campaigns  it  had  started  against  greedy 
and  unscrupulous  corporations,  it  would  not  now  need 
any  help  from  the  Mexican  government. 

The  most  aggressive  and  violent  campaign  was 
conducted  against  a  street  car  company,  an  American 
company.  The  number  of  killed  and  maimed  in  a  year 
by  the  street  cars  reached  the  appalling  figure  of  765, 
as  the  company  refused  to  spend  any  money  on  fenders. 
I  suggested  going  after  the  cabinet  ministers  to  force 
them  to  bring  pressure  on  the  management  of  the  cor- 
poration, but  at  this  suggestion  the  president  and  the 
director  of  El  Diario  suffered  suddenly  from  an  attack 
of  cold  feet,  from  which  they  have  not  yet  recovered. 

Although  Porfirio  Diaz  and  his  clique  and  all  the 
governors  have  tried  with  all  their  might  to  eradicate 
the  opposition  press,  it  always  crops  up  as  irrepres- 
sible and  incorrigible  as  ever. 

They  have  beaten,  kicked  into  submission,  bought 
off,  and  murdered  hundreds  of  newspapermen;  these 
martyrs  and  heroes  of  a  hopeless  cause;  and  still  the 
tribe  cannot  be  stamped  out,  to  the  disgust  and  des- 
pair of  the  administration. 

Before  every  fake  reelection,  which  is  enacted 
every  six  years,  like  the  military  manoeuvres,  there  is  a 
general  expedition  over  the  country,-  to  capture,  im- 
prison and  destroy  all  the  independent  newspapers, 
in  the  manner  of  the  police  of  New  York,  who  arrest 
all  the  pickpockets  and  thieves  to  be  foimd  in  the  city 
before  a  holiday. 

In  1902  to  kill  all  opposition  for  the  coming  election. 
The  following  newspapers  were  persecuted  or  subjected 
to  trial  on  various  trivial  excuses. 

.102 


In  Mexico  City  : 

In  Zacatecas. 

I.  El  Hijo  del  Ahuizote. 

2S.     El  Sentinela. 

2.  El  Paladin. 

In  Pachuca. 

3.  Onofrof. 

24.     El  Desfanatizador. 

4.  ElAlacran. 

In  Guanajuato. 

5.  La  Nacion  Espanola. 

25.     El  Barretero. 

6.  El  Diario  del  Hogar. 

26.     El  Sable. 

7.  El  Universal. 

In  San  Luis  Potosi. 

In  GuadaIvAJAra  : 

27.     La  Opinion  Publica. 

8.  Juan  Panadero. 

28.     El  Demofilo. 

9.  La  Tarantula. 

In  Mateguala. 

10.  Diogenes. 

29.    La  Avispa. 

II.  Jalisco  Libre. 

30.     El  Democrata. 

12.  LaLibertad. 

31.     El  Progreso. 

13.  El  Correo  de  Jalisco 

In  Monterey: 

14.  La  Gaceta. 

32.  La  Democracia  Latina. 

In  MoreIvIA  : 

S^.  La  Redencion. 

15.  ElCorsario. 

34.  Justicia  y  Constitucion, 

In  Hermosillo. 

In  Linaris.  N.  L. 

16.     El  Sol. 

35.  El  Trueno. 

17.     La  Luna. 

In  Chihuahua. 

18.     La  Libertad. 

36.  La  Voz  de  Altamirano. 

19.     El  Democrata. 

In  Tezuitlan.  Ca. 

20.     El  Combate. 

37.  El  Cuarto.     Poder. 

In  Durango. 

In  Tampico  : 

21.     La  Evolucion. 

38.  Balaraza. 

In  Irapuato. 

39.  Oja  Blanca 

22.     El  Avance. 

This  is  only  a  partial  black  list  of  this  newspaper 
morgue.  In  this  period  coincides  the  persecution  of  the 
liberal  clubs,  which  in  that  year  were  suppressed  by 
General  Bernardo  Reyes,  then  minister  of  war,  by  order 
of  Porfirio  Diaz. 

On  January  24th  a  Mexican  Congressman,  then  on 
his  way  to  the  north,  left  in  San  Luis  Potosi,  a  well- 
known  Mexican  General  and  Governor  of  a  State, 
who,  accompanied  by  some  soldiers  disguised  as 
peasants,  entered  the  political  club  Ponciano  Arriaga 


103 


and  there  created  a  scandal  for  the  purpose  of  having 
the  directors  of  this  club  arrested  and  landed  in  jail. 
Thie  club  was  recognized  by  all  the  other  liberal  clubs 
(existing  then  in  all  the  principal  cities  in  Mexico)  as 
the  head  and  the  centre  of  the  confederation  of  all  the 
liberals. 

In  this  manner  Porfirio  Diaz  killed  the  liberal 
organization  at  the  source  of  power.  This  is  also  the 
way  the  old  hypocrite  prepares  for  a  general  and  unan- 
imous election  by  the  will  of  the  people. 

Napoleon  Bonaparte  who  was  a  genius,  declared 
once  that  if  he  allowed  a  free  press  in  France  under  his 
regime,  he  would  not  last  three  weeks. 

Porfirio  Diaz  who  is  not  a  genius,  except  for  chi- 
canery and  inquisition,  would  last  just  about  three  days 
with  a  free  press  in  Mexico. 

Bolivia  represents  for  the  president  an  ideal  state 
of  affairs;  there.  General  Arce  published  a  decree  in  the 
"  Diario  Official" :  "The  Press  is  at  liberty  to  write  about 
everything,  excepting  religion  and  the  government." 

The  president's  dream  would  be  a  press  without 
commentaries,  just  news  from  all  over  the  world,  and 
what  the  government  would  kindly  allow  to  be  pub- 
lished, with  the  addition  of  hymns  and  hosannas  in  his 
honor 


102 


Anyone  can  be  a  pilot  in  fine  weather. 

Bacon. 


Political   Parties. 

When  we  say  political  parties  we  use  a  conventional 
word,  for  in  Mexico,  as  will  easily  be  understood,  there 
are  not  and  cannot  subsist  political  parties,  since  for 
more  than  thirty  years  the  same  individual  has  ruled 
as  absolute  master.  To  the  existence  of  political  par- 
ties there  must  concur  a  public  spirit  or  opinion — and 
this  Porfirio  Diaz  killed  at  the  beginning  of  his  political 
career. 

Mexican  society  was  divided,  during  many  years, 
into  two  contending  parties ;  on  the  one  hand  the  reac- 
tionary party,  headed  by  the  clergy  and  supported  by 
the  army,  the  Spaniards  and  by  those  who  had  aristo- 
cratic pretensions ;  on  the  other  the  liberal  party,  repub- 
lican with  revolutionary  tendencies,  represented  by  the 
most  talented  men  in  the  country,  also  the  middle  class, 
which  as  everywhere,  manifested  the  strongest  impulses 
and  highest  ideals. 

The  reactionary  party,  defeated  by  Benito  Juarez  in 
the  bloody  contest  called  the  three  years  war  (1857-60), 
brought  about  French  Intervention  and  the  lugubrious 
experiment  of  the  Empire,  ending  in  the  killing  of  Max- 
imilian of  Austria.  With  the  death  of  the  Emperor  and 
his  two  most  prominent  followers,  the  reactionary  party 
was  vanquished  and  disorganized;  nevertheless  as  the 
clergy  was  still  left  standing,  they  took  good  care 
to  keep  the  fire  glowing  under  the  ashes,  and  in  silence 
and  mystery  began  acquiring  wealth  and  building  anew, 
without  taking  an  active  part  in  politics,  but  preparing 
to  become  a  powerful  factor  at  the  first  opportunity, 
that  is  to  say  when  Porfirio  Diaz  shall  die. 

The  liberal  party  became  disorganized  after  the 
triumph  of  General  Diaz,  and  he  has  taken  care  to  choke 
it  lingeringly,  without  killing  it  outright,  as  he  needed  it 

107 


to  check  the  impetus  of  the  reactionaries  if  they  should 
unmask  their  batteries. 

The  heads  of  the  old  liberal  party  disappeared 
either  by  natural  death  or  by  assassination,  as  I  have 
shown;  the  rest  are  in  a  state  of  mental  and  physical 
decrepitude.  Generals  Corona,  Garcia  de  la  Cadena, 
Mejia,  Regules,  Escobedo,  J.  N.  Mendez  and  all  those 
who  figured  in  the  campaigns  against  the  reactionaries 
and  the  Empire,  are  all  dead,  with  the  exception  of 
Porfirio  Diaz.  The  apostles  of  liberty,  Ignacio  Ramir- 
ez, Ignacio  Altamirano,Guillermo  Prieto,  Riva  Palacio, 
Zamacona  etc.  have  all  perished  during  the  long  reign 
of  Diaz.  Two  men  are  left,  Ignacio  Mariscal  and  Felix 
Romero,  both  are  mumified,  one  in  the  foreign  office, 
the  other  in  the  supreme  court.  Both  are  honorable 
and  honest  men,  whose  only  blunder  was  to  be  deceived 
by  the  Great  Mystifier. 

The  clerical  party  keeps  and  increases  its  influence 
by  the  press,  having  good  newspapers  in  the  capital  and 
in  the  states;  on  the  other  hand  the  liberal  party  has 
lost  its  representatives  in  the  press,  some  having  been 
sold  to  Porfirio  Diaz  and  others  having  had  to  suspend 
their  publications  on  accotmt  of  the  persecutions  of  the 
government;  the  only  one  which  outlived  them  was  "El 
Diario  del  Hogar",  leading  a  life  full  of  tribulations  and 
anxieties,  its  heroic  director  Filomeno  Mata  having 
suffered  repeated  imprisonments. 

The  following  incident  will  exemplify  the  insidious 
and  treacherous  ways  used  by  the  clericals  to  suppress 
opposition  or  liberalism  in  their  midst. 

In  1 90 1  a  priest  called  Joachin  Perez,  50  years  old, 
wrote  to  Monsignor  Averardi ,  apostolic  delegate,  letters  in 
which  he  begged  for  the  modification  of  the  high  tariff 
for  the  administration  of  the  sacrements.  The  petition 
was  signed  by  thousands  of  Catholics.  Monsignor 
Averardi  diplomatically  answered  that  he  would  con- 
sult with  the  Pope.  But  instead  of  so  doing,  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Puebla  and  the  Monsignor,  gave  a  private 
dinner  to  Mucio  Martinez,  governor  of  Puebla,  and  con- 

108 


vinced  him  that  Perez  was  hatching  a  poHtical  conspi- 
racy. By  order  of  the  governor  the  unfortunate  priest 
was  attacked  in  his  parish  at  Alixco,  at  midnight, 
beaten  and  then  taken  to  jail.  All  his  property  and 
chattels  were  confiscated  and  although  suffering  from 
rheumatism,  he  was  kept  in  confinement  for  over  four- 
teen months.  Eventually  through  the  efforts  of  his 
sister  who  went  to  beg  the  intervention  of  her  imcle 
Ignacio  Mariscal,  he  was  freed. 

A  great  deal  has  been  said  about  the  "Scientific 
Party",  this  however  has  never  existed  as  a  party  since 
it  does  not  deserve  the  name.  It  would  be  more  ade- 
quate to  call  this  group  of  political  speculators,  united 
to  exploit  the  nation,  the  "scientific  grafters". 

This  group  is  headed  by  J.  Y.  Liman tour,  the  min- 
ister of  finances,  co-worker,  partner  and  accomplice  of 
Porfirio  Diaz  in  all  the  unsavory  deals.  It  is  formed  by 
various  improvised  economists,  who  plagarized  Leroy 
Beaulieu  and  Auguste  Comte  in  the  most  impudent  and 
barefaced  manner.  They  are  all  clever  and  intelligent 
though  perhaps  too  much  so.  They  form  a  sort  of 
Chinese  wall  arotmd  the  minister  of  finances,  who  is 
their  Pactolus,  so  that  anyone  not  of  the  ring  cannot 
bathe  in  its  golden  waters.  They  are  lawyers,  bankers, 
and  newspapermen,  and  no  business  of  any  importance 
can  be  arranged  with  the  government  nor  prosper  in 
the  press,  nor  get  justice  in  the  tribtmals,  without  sanc- 
tion from  this  moneyed  oligarchy.  This  group  em- 
boldened by  success,  pretended  to  elevate  to  the 
presidency  its  chief  Limantour,  not  on  a  political 
question,  but  solely  on  a  business  principle,  to  continue 
indefinitely  and  on  a  greater  scale  its  work  of  exploita- 
tion. 

Here  is  the  inside  history  of  how  Limantour  lost 
the  vice-presidency  through  an  indiscretion  at  a  five 
o'clock  tea.  The  members  of  the  "cientificos"  or  scien- 
tific group  had  convinced  the  president  of  the  political 
necessity  of  visiting  Europe  and  the  United  States  in  the 
manner  of  Gen.  Grant.     The  argument  was  that  such 

loe 


a  trip  would  not  only  enhance  the  prestige  of  the 
country  by  advertising  the  president's  name  all  over  the 
world,  but  likewise  the  foreign  nations  would  then  see, 
that  Porfirio  Diaz  could  leave  Mexico  in  peace  with 
lyimantour  as  vice-president. 

President  Diaz  felt  safe  as  far  as  Limantour  was 
concerned,  expecting  to  leave  Gen.  Reyes  in  the  war 
office  as  a  counter-weight  on  the  balance  of  this  political 
game.  But  Limantour  told  the  secret  to  his  wife,  who 
in  her  joy  could  not  resist  confiding  to  some  of  her  lady 
friends  "that  the  next  five  o'clock  tea  would  take  place 
in  the  Castle  Chapultepec."  These  two  women  ran 
post-haste  to  relate  the  conversation  to  Carmelita  Diaz, 
the  wife  of  the  president.  Carmelita,  as  she  is  called 
by  the  Mexicans,  was  very  much  offended  in  her 
dignity  and  vanity  as  queen  of  Mexico ;  instead  of  com- 
plaining to  the  president,  she  did  the  cleverest  thing 
possible,  asking  one  of  the  best  friends  of  Porfirio  Diaz, 
Governor  Dehesa  of  Vera-Cruz,  to  see  her;  she  repeated 
the  incident,  adding  that  "if  those  people  acted  so  super- 
ciliously while  still  subordinates,  what  would  they  do 
when  they  should  be  in  power  and  Porfirio  out 
of  the  country?"  She  begged  Dehesa  to  work  in  her 
interest  and  also  for  his  friend  Porfirio.  Dehesa  per- 
formed his  task  so  well  that  he  convinced  the  president 
of  his  mistake,  and  the  result  was  that  Dehesa  was  or- 
dered to  call  on  Limantour  to  sign  a  statement  revoking 
his  word. 

In  this  "scientific  group"  figured  for  a  long  time 
as  an  active  lieutenant,  a  Rosendo  Pineda,  of  whom 
we  will  speak  later.  In  opposition  to  this  group  is  the 
"Reyist  party", which  became  prominent  when  its  chief 
General  Bernc-rdo  Reyes  was  minister  of  war.  The 
antecedents  of  Reyes  were  not  of  the  kind  to  make  him 
popular,  for  there  are  in  his  life  bloody  deeds  which 
render  him  even  more  fearful  than  Porfirio  Diaz.  But 
Reyes  is  not  a  thief  and  if  he  tried  to  appear  as  a  patriot, 
a  liberal  and  an  ultra-mexican,  he  was  the  only  man  for 
the  moment  who  could  be  used  to  counteract  the  influ- 

110 


ence  of  the  scientific  party  and  Limantour,  inasmuch  as 
he  represented  political  ideals  opposite  to  those  of  his 
rivals.  Reyes  created  the  "Second  Reserve",  which 
was  a  sort  of  national  guard  at  the  service  and  under 
the  will  of  the  war  office.  In  this  second  reserve  were 
permitted  to  join  in  an  official  character  and  with  the 
right  to  carry  sword  and  uniform,  all  the  citizens  who 
could  prove  by  an  examination  that  they  had  the  rudi- 
mentary knowledge  expected  from  a  second  lieutenant. 
Workingmen  who  could  pass  the  requisite  examina- 
tions were  also  allowed  to  join  this  national  reserve  as 
corporals  and  sergeants.  The  idea  appealed  to  the 
masses  and  awakened  wonderful  enthusiasm ;  all  under- 
stood the  meaning  of  that  move  and  the  advantages 
which  could  be  derived  at  a  moment's  notice  from  such 
an  organization.  But  Limantour  realized  the  impor- 
tance of  this  stroke  of  policy  and  as  I  have  said  in 
another  chapter,  Reyes  was  eliminated  from  the  minis- 
try and  the  second  reserve  was  abolished  immediately. 

The  "Reyists"  reached  the  utmost  of  the  resis- 
tance and  bitterness  against  Limantour  and  his  "cienti- 
ficos",  in  the  campaign  warred  against  them.  They 
started  newspapers  and  attacked  the  "ring"  with  a 
courage  and  a  violence  up  to  that  date  unknown  to  the 
Mexican  press.  Many  young  men  of  talent  and  influ- 
ence figured  in  the  newspapers.  The  most  prominent 
of  all  was  Rodolfo  Reyes,  son  of  General  Reyes,  a  law- 
yer of  talent,  fearless,  energetic,  cultured,  with  a  spot- 
less private  life;  he  will  rise  to  a  high  position  in  the 
land  when  the  conditions  of  the  country  shall  have 
changed,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  is  the  son  of  Gen. 
Reyes.  I  once  asked  him,  his  and  his  father's  political 
platform  and  he  answered:  "My  father  and  I  are 
working  each  one  for  himself,  although  we  have  this 
political  ideal  in  common ;  we  object  to  mixing  business 
with  politics." 

The  two  sons  of  the  then  minister  of  justice,  the 
Baranda  boys,  were  ver>'  audacious  in  their  attacks. 

Ill 


The  most  talented  writers  were  Luis  del  Toro,  Dr. 
Francisco  Martinez  Calleja,  Jose  J.  Ortiz,  and  Diodoro 
Battalia;  they  published  "El  Correo  de  Mexico"  and 
"La  Nacion",  and  certainly  Mexico  has  never  seen 
such  impetuous,  masterly,  caustic  and  forceful  editor- 
ials. Poor  Limantour  and  his  "scientific  ring"  were 
raked  mercilessly  over  the  coals  of  publicity,  and  they 
were  stripped  of  their  political  hypocrisies  to  the  very 
skin  and  bone. 

If  a  five  o'clock  tea  spoiled  the  vice-presidential 
chances  of  Limantour,  the  editorials  of  the  two  above 
mentioned  papers  discredited  him  as  a  presidential 
candidate  in  the  eyes  of  the  Mexican  public. 

In  the  group  of  the  "Reyists"  there  was  also  a 
minister,  Joachin  Baranda  the  most  intelligent  of  all, 
who  exercised  a  great  influence  in  the  states  of  Cam- 
peche  and  Yucatan,  whose  governors  were  his  creatures. 
Teodoro  Dehesa,  a  sort  of  Mazarin.  the  most  subtle  and 
clever  of  all  the  Mexican  politicians,  was  governor  of 
Vera-Cruz,  and  General  Abraham  Bandala,  nicknamed 
"the  Vandal",  governor  of  the  state  of  Tabasco,  so 
that  "  Reyism"  dominated  all  the  gulf  states  of  Mexico. 
With  the  exit  of  Reyes  from  the  war  office  and  the  de- 
struction of  the  second  reserve,  the  shares  of  this  group, 
were  lowered  many  points,  until  it  went  into  a  partial 
slumber.  When  Porfirio  Diaz  created  the  vice-presi- 
dency at  the  suggestion  of  Washington,  the  "scientific 
party"  again  came  into  life,  attempting  to  bring  pres- 
sure on  the  president  so  that  he  should  designate  Lim- 
antour. Unluckily  it  was  too  late,  for  it  had  been  proved 
that  this  individual  was  disqualified  from  exercising 
that  function  by  the  constitution  and  although  the 
constitution  is  no  obstacle  to  Porfirio  Diaz,  he  does 
not  violate  it  to  favor  a  third  party  but  only  for  his  own 
personal  benefit. 

The  "Reyists"  also  tried  to  intrigue  in  Reyes' 
favor,  but  Gen.  Reyes  tmderstood  the  awkwardness 
and  untimeliness  of  the  move  and  hiding  imder  the 

112 


cloak  ol  militaiy  discipline,  forbade  his  partisans  to 
imitate  the  tactless  proceedings  of  the  "cientificos." 

Porfirio  Diaz  then  freely  and  spontaneously  "el- 
ected" Ramon  Corral  for  the  vice-presidency,  to  the 
utter  amazement  of  the  coimtry,  for  Corral  was  an 
unknown  factor  in  politics,  a  sort  of  dark  horse.  This 
new  move  brought  about  a  fresh  political  situation, 
and  as  it  was  thought  that  Corral  would  substitute  his 
protector,  the  desertions  began.  The  "cientificos" 
imposed  as  coadjutor  to  Corral,  a  Rosendo  Pineda,  the 
Jago  of  the  "cientificos",  now  Corral's  Mephisto,  This 
Rosendo  Pineda,  is  from  Oaxaca;  he  was  for  several 
years  the  private  secretary  to  Romero  Rubio  (father-in 
law  of  Porfirio  Diaz)  when  minister  of  the  interior,  and 
consequently  knew  all  the  inside  workings  of  local 
politics.  Lawyer  of  mediocre  quality,  indifferent  as  an 
orator,  he  possesses  nevertheless  great  audacity  and 
an  insatiable  ambition,  having  built  up  a  false 
reputation  which  he  exploits  to  [the  utmost  of  his 
ability.  Pineda  with  the  ctmning  of  an  Indian  and 
the  perspicacity  of  a  lawyer,  understood  at  once  the 
situation  and  instead  of  watching  Corral  to  direct  him 
in  conformity  to  the  interests  of  the  "cientificos", 
made  a  deal  with  him,  pitching  his  party  overboard, 
to  bask  and  profit  in  the  new  rising  sun  of  the  political 
horizon.  Corral  guided  by  his  intuition  and  perhaps 
by  the  counsels  of  Pineda,  did  not  give  much  import 
ance  to  the  vice-presidency,  limiting  himself  to  be  a 
secretary  in  the  presidential  cabinet,  blindly  obedient 
to  his  chief  and  attending  to  his  private  business, 
which  has  yielded  him  an  enormous  fortune,  and 
waiting  calmly  for  time  to  resolve  the  question.  He 
is  not  popular  in  Mexico;  no  man  would  be  allowed 
to  become  popular  or  to  create  a  party  of  his  own, 
for  Porfirio  Diaz  would  start  his  underground  ma- 
chinery to  destroy  such  a  one. 

Corral  is  in  a  most  difficult  position,  second  to  a 
man  who  does  not  permit  any  political  star  to  outshine 
his  own  sun.     Nevertheless  one  cannot  help  admiring 

113 


hig  tact,  his  silence,  the  art  of  doing  the  right  thing  at 
the  right  time,  his  abihty  to  pilot  the  vice-presidential 
skiff  over  the  breakers  which  have  destroyed  so  many 
politicians.  He  is  endowed  with  a  sense  of  humor, 
sagacity  and  character  and  he  should  be  judged  only 
after  he  has  been  president.  In  the  years  I  have 
passed  in  Mexico  I  have  heard  many  disparaging  re- 
marks and  superficial  judgments  about  the  man ;  only 
once  did  I  hear  a  true,  just  and  imparcial  appreciation 
of  him  from  a  Mexican,  a  talented  young  liberal, 
all  the  more  remarkable  as  this  man  was  not  in  politics 
and  owed  nothing  to  Corral. 

In  short,  there  are  no  political  parties  in  Mexico, 
only  small  personal  groups,  which,  circumstances  per- 
mitting, will  be  used  as  a  nucleus  to  form  real  parties. 

As  a  result  of  the  perfidious  declarations  of  Por- 
firio  Diaz  to  Creelman  in  Pearson's  Magazine,  assuring 
him  that  under  no  circumstances  would  he  accept 
another  presidential  term,  many  Mexicans  fell  into  this 
trap,  innocently  believing  the  protestation  of  the  old 
fox,  and  began  promoting  the  formation  of  parties  to 
take  part  in  the  next  electoral  fight.  This  electoral 
struggle  is  an  impossibility,  because  even  if  Porfirio 
Diaz  really  should  not  crave  reelection,  he  would  never 
consent  to  a  man  not  of  his  own  making  sitting  in  the 
presidential  chair.  What  was  self-evident  to  anybody 
knowing  the  hoary  old  Michiavelli,  happened,  and  that 
is,  that  Porfirio  Diaz  graciously  condescended  to  accept 
reelection  and  in  view  of  this,  those  who  dreamt  of 
leading  in  the  next  campaign,  are  satisfied  to  accept 
the  job  of  head  supers,  orchestra  leaders,  and  chiefs  of 
choruses,  making  believe  they  are  organizing  indepen- 
dent political  clubs,  not  to  elect  (?)  a  president,  as  this 
is  not  even  tmder  discussion,  but  to  elect  the  vice-pres- 
ident designated  by  President  Diaz.  There  is  no 
conduct  more  ignoble,  more  cowardly  than  that  of  these 
sicarii  who  wish  to  appear  before  the  people  wearing  the 
seamless  tunic  of  the  apostles.  Porfirio  Diaz  following 
his  wise  system  "that  to  divide  is  to  rule"  has  made 

114 


Reyes  believe  that  he  might  be  the  next  vice-president. 
Reyes  answered  this  pretended  offer  in  an  very  common- 
place interview,  putting  himself  unconditionally  at  the 
orders  of  his  superior.  Seven  editorials  in  "  La  Patria" 
killed  the  candidacy  of  Creel;  the  only  one  left  now  is 
Corral,  who  continues  his  policy  of  silence,  in  his  shell, 
like  an  Indian  fakir. 

Porfirio  Diaz  has  no  more  idea  of  relinquishing 
power,  than  I  have  of  becoming  president  of  Patagonia ; 
he  has  no  intention  of  slackening  the  reins  of  his  iron 
rule,  to  help  the  democrats  or  the  liberals  or  the  Mexi- 
cans in  general  to  learn  how  to  govern  themselves.  He 
will  die  in  the  presidential  chair  like  an  insect  stuck  on 
fly  paper.  Meanwhile  the  work  of  evolution  is  slowly 
but  surely  taking  place,  the  yoimger  generations  with 
higher  ideals  than  those  of  Porfirio  Diaz  and  his  cronies 
or  the  greedy  "  cientificos"  are  taking  notes  of  the  show 
unfolding  under  their  eyes.  Young  Mexico  will  have  a 
say,  as  soon  as  the  storm  of  reaction  shall  have  blown 
away  after  Diaz's  death.  Two  yotmg  men  with  talent 
and  devoted  friends  will  then  play  a  prominent  part: 
Rodolfo  Reyes  and  Emeterio  de  la  Garza.  The  latter 
has  all  the  attributes  of  leadership;  he  is  loyal  to  his 
friends,  talented,  a  clever  speaker  and  writer,  excessive- 
ly bold  and  fearless,  intelligent  and  always  ready  to 
face  any  situation,  no  matter  how  hopeless  and  dis- 
couraging. As  the  noisiest  always  attract  attention, 
these  two  young  men  will  impose  themselves  in  spite  of 
their  youth  Others  of  the  younger  generation  full  of 
talent,  patriotism  and  honesty  of  purpose  will  help  to 
direct  the  future  destiny  of  Mexico.  Some  of  these  are 
Diodoro  Battalia,  the  most  talented  orator  and  patriot 
in  the  country,  Diaz  Miron,  Joachin  Clausel,  Gabriel 
Gonzalez  Mier,   Ignacio  de  la  Pena,  Carlos  Percy ra. 

The  clerical  party  which  has  received  its  greatest 
support  from  Carmelita  Diaz  during  the  present  regime, 
will  have  to  look  out  for  its  laurels  if  it  does  not  mend  its 
short-sighted  ways,  since  a  continuation  of  the  old, 
narrow-minded  policy  will  have  for  effect  a  schism  of 

115 


the  liberal  Catholics  in  Mexico  from  the  mother  church 
in  Rome. 

The  situation  after  the  death  of  Porfirio  Diaz  will 
be  at  the  start  a  race  for  the  presidency  between  Corral 
and  General  Reyes,  if  Porfirio  Diaz  insists  in  putting 
Corral  as  a  vice-president.  Corral  will  prove  his  mettle 
in  the  first  three  weeks  after  the  death  of  the  president, 
for  the  "cientificos"  consider  Reyes  not  only  their 
greatest  enemy,  but  a  danger  and  a  menace  to  the 
state.  I  have  heard  several  of  these  "cientificos"  talk 
about  Reyes's  assassination,  not  only  as  an  outcome 
of  the  rivalry  but  as  a  political  necessity.  Now  Reyes 
knows  this  perfectly  well  and  he  lives  on  a  mountain, 
in  a  castle  called  "  El  Mirador"  like  a  mediaeval  robber 
baron,  ready  to  swoop  on  to  Mexico  like  a  bird  of  prey. 
He  is  over  60  and  is  extremely  ambitious  to  be  presi- 
dent ;  if  he  has  to  choose  between  being  assassinated  or 
snatching  the  presidency  from  Corral,  the  guesses  might 
be  in  his  favor.  Should  he  start  from  Monterrey  with 
25  men  he  would  reach  Mexico  City  with  an  army  of 
25,000.  Nevertheless  and  no  matter  who  will  be  presi- 
dent, a  continuation  of  the  present  methods  is  not  pos- 
sible and  will  not  be  permitted  by  the  people  in  general. 
They  are  all  tired  and  sick  of  those  perverse  and  injur- 
ious methods,  and  if  they  have  stood  Porfirio  Diaz  so 
long,  it  is  not  because  of  cowardice,  but  because  they 
expected  him  to  die  almost  ten  years  ago,  and  being  dis- 
appointed in  this,  have  not  thought  that  the  assassin's 
dagger  would  help  matters  or  improve  their  conditions. 

Everybody  is  weary  of  this  protracted,  tiresome 
farce  of  a  perpetual,  seemingly  immortal,  peripathetic 
candidate  for  the  presidency ;  they  are  anxiously  watch- 
ing for  a  sign  of  mental  and  physical  decay  in  the  coun- 
tenance of  this  apparently  indestructible  oppressor, 
whose  best  ally  has  been  death,  for  it  refused  to  take  a 
life  as  helpful  in  exterminating  lives,  as  conflagrations, 
epidemics  or  earthquakes.  They  pray  for  an  end  to 
this  endless  career  and  gaze  at  the  lines  and  wrinkles 
of  that  impassive  mask  for  a  prophecy  of  a  speedy  close. 

116 


"We  have  had  enough  of  him"  said  a  Mexican  to 
me  once.  "  But"  I  exclaimed  "  he  cannot  possibly  live 
more  than  two  years." — "  Don'tdeceive  yourself  ",  replied 
my  friend  "one  of  these  days  when  Porfirio  shall  feel 
the  icy  touch  of  death  upon  his  shoulder,  he  will  hastily 
pick  up  a  pen  and  publish  a  decree  to  live  another  twenty 
years". 


117 


As  he  thinketh  in  bis  heart,  so  is  he. 

Proverbs.  XXIII.  7. 

You  can't  overturn  a  pyramid,  but  you  can  under- 
mine it;  that's  what  I  have  been  trying  to  do. 

A.  Lincoln. 


Porfirio   Diaz. 

What  manner  of  person  is  this  Porfirio  Diaz? 
Official  admiration  and  servility,  sycophancy,  at  times 
well-meaning  eulog>^  and  above  all  foreign  ignorance, 
have  all  contributed  to  the  formation  of  an  astonishing 
legend,  the  creation  of  a  surprising  myth  surrounding 
this  individual,  so  that  a  fair,  searching  and  dispassion- 
ate analysis  seems  almost  like  an  iconoclastic  attitude. 

He  has  been  labeled  the  greatest  statesman  of 
modem  times;  more  eminent  than  Bismark;  superior  in 
generalship  to  Caesar,  Alexander  and  Bonaparte;  more 
transcendental  than  Washington  and  Lincoln;  purer  in 
his  patriotism  than  Mazzini  or  Garibaldi;  more  subtly 
diplomatic  than  Leo  XIII  or  Talleyrand ;  as  God-like 
as  Christ,  Buddha  and  Sri  Krishna,  and  he  has  been 
addressed  as  the  greatest  thing  in  America,  beside  the 
Amazon  and  the  Andes,  (sic) .  In  1 899  two  Latin-Ameri- 
can journalists  had  a  discussion  as  to  which  would  excite 
greater  public  attention,  the  account  of  a  great  scientific 
discover^"  or  a  eulogy  on  some  great  man.  To  test  the 
matter  one  published  as  news  the  story  of  a  wonderful 
invention  affecting  the  cultivation  of  cane  sugar,  the 
other  published  an  interview  with  Tolstoy  panegyrising 
Porfirio  Diaz.  Both  were  fictions  made  out  of  the 
whole  cloth.  The  former  passed  unnoticed,  but  the 
latter  was  reproduced  in  every  paper  in  the  land  and 
has  been  quoted  in  the  life  of  Porfirio  Diaz  as  a  strong 
argument  for  his  continuance  in  power. 

To  an  honest  man  all  this  indiscriminate  lying, 
coarse  flattery  is  nauseating,  to  a  humorous  person  it  is 
idiotic,  to  the  intelligent  it  only  proves  the  low  mental 
caHber  of  Porfirio  Diaz  and  his  sycophants. 

Physically  this  man  of  destiny  has  been  endowed 
by  nature  with  a  perfection  almost  superhuman.  He 
has  cultivated  this  gift  by  a  wondrously  laborious  and 

121 


strenuous  activity.  Up  to  the  age  of  37  he  fought 
almost  incessantly,  thereby  steeling  his  muscles,  forti- 
fying his  constitution  by  a  vigorous,  sober  and  chaste 
conduct  of  life.  His  Indian  ancestry  gave  him  the 
brawn,  the  Spanish  forefathers  the  brain  capacity. 

Middle  sized,  for  the  excellent  proportion  of  his 
limbs  he  seems  tall.  The  hands  and  feet  are  large,  his 
gestures  measured,  calm.  The  forehead  is  low,  sloping, 
unintellectual,  the  eyes  beady,  piercing,  at  times  kindly 
and  humorous,  always  observant  and  suspicious.  The 
nose  deformed  by  the  arched,  dilated  nares,  resembles 
that  of  a  wide-nostriled,  snorting  horse  after  a  gallop. 
The  chin  broad  with  powerful  mandibles,  is  set  and  mas- 
sive as  a  tortilla  grinder;  ears  large,  imgainly,  with  their 
elongated  lobes,  characteristic  of  long-lived  men  and 
races.  White  hair  and  mustache,  the  skin  fair,  with  a 
constant  flush  and  hectic  red  patches. 

Compare  this  description  with  his  portrait  at  the 
age  of  37  or  before,  the  transformation  is  marvellous, 
well-nigh  incredible.  The  earliest  photos  or  daguero- 
types  represent  a  common,  brutal,  almost  criminal 
countenance.  The  shock  of  black  hair,  small  drooping 
moustache  and  chin  whiskers,  the  swarthy  skin,  make  a 
composite  picture  of  a  well  dressed  pelado  and  a  Japan- 
ese valet.  What  with  rubbing,  scrubbing,  showerbaths, 
soap  and  human  food  he  has  changed  from  a  greasy 
condottiere  into  a  full  blown  white  czar,  a  cross  between 
a  low-browed  Bismark  and  an  Aztec  Cripi. 

With  a  far-reaching  purpose  he  sacrificed  every- 
thing to  his  all-absorbing  ambition,  and  like  a  new 
Saturn  devoured  the  children  of  his  desires  as  fast  as 
they  appeared.  His  health,  his  energy,  his  time  were 
devoted  to  the  one  purpose ;  what  to  other  men  are  at- 
tractions, distractions  and  amusements,  were  swept 
aside  when  they  did  not  fall  in  with  his  own  line  of 
conduct.  Gambling,  smoking,  drinking,  women,  the 
theatres,  the  fine  arts,  sports,  reading,  leisure,  he  re- 
nounced to  concentrate  his  energies  upon  that  great 
game  of  pohtics  and  personal  ambition,  in  which  bril- 

122 


liancy  often  fails  when  a  constant  plodding,  alert 
attitude  will  bring  success. 

Politically  an  intruder  and  socially  an  outcast, 
Porfirio  Diaz  slowly  climbed  the  ladder  by  all  available 
means.  His  marriage  to  the  daughter  of  Romero  Rubio 
belonging  to  one  of  the  best  families  in  Mexico  paved 
the  way  for  social  recognition ;  he  attached  to  his  body 
guard  practically  as  a  valet  the  proud  and  blue  blooded 
millioniare  Pablo  Escandon  and  married  his  own 
natural  daughter  to  one  of  the  richest  Mexicans  in  the 
land.  And  this  ex-maurader  and  political  bandit, 
whose  father  the  popular  legend  points  to  as  a  priest, 
whose  mother  was  a  Mixed  Indian,  whose  natural 
offspring  he  kindly  introduced  into  society,  whose  son- 
in-law  is  a  notorious  homo-sexual  and  whose  brother-in- 
law  is  an  alcoholic  lawyer  and  a  fearless  trollop  hunter, 
now  poses  as  the  arbiter  of  aristocracy  in  Mexico  and 
decides  who-is-who  among  the  upper  ten. 

He  knew  better  however  than  to  visit  Europe  and 
America  officially,  thereby  inviting  the  homage,  the 
curiosity  and  the  judgment  of  foreigners,  for  his  wife 
gave  him  away  once  when  she  answered  the  insistent 
query  "Why  Porfirio  did  not  visit  Europe?" — "He  is 
afraid"  she  remarked  "of  cutting  a  poor  figure,"  and 
then  suddenly  recalling  herself,  "because  he  does  not 
speak  foreign  languages." 

His  private  life  for  the  last  thirty  years  has  been 
spotless  and  although  surrounded  by  all  the  luxuries  he 
has  led  a  life  simple  as  a  hermit's;  in  food  and  drink 
abstemious  as  an  Arab,  in  a  cotmtry  where  everybody 
smokes  he  has  been  an  exception,  where  alcoholism  is 
rampant  he  only  tastes  water,  where  everybody  goes  to 
bull  fights  he  stays  at  home;  does  not  visit  theatres 
except  at  official  functions,  seldom  hunts,  never  plays. 
Private  life,  personal  hygiene,  hard  work,  physical  and 
intellectual  economy  have  been  concentrated  for  the 
prolongation  of  power  through  the  medium  of  a  perfect 
body. 

All  his  time,  spare  moments,  are  taken  up  by  his 

123 


special  duties;  he  does  not  shirk  official  drudgery  and 
will  attend  the  unveiling  of  a  monument  as  punctually 
as  he  will  receive  a  caller.  He  will  lend  a  patient  ear  to 
petitions,  demands,  protestations,  adultations;  will  re- 
ceive foreign  officials  and  visitors,  ministers  and  consuls, 
governors,  jefes  politicos,  and  will  listen  to  all,  silent, 
attentive,  inscrutable,  spare  of  words,  ambiguous  in 
his  promises,  deliberate  in  speech  and  in  manner.  With 
a  keen  and  instinctive  knowledge  of  men,  enhanced  by 
his  long  experience  in  office,  he  is  also  endowed  with  a 
wonderful  memory  for  names  and  faces,  and  is  a  walking 
encyclopedia  of  all  the  people  in  Mexico;  he  keeps  a 
watchful  eye  on  every  enemy  and  friend,  forgetting 
sometimes  but  never  pardoning. 

When  General  Reyes  of  Columbia  asked  him  once 
if  he  considered  Limantour  a  great  statesman,  he 
answered:  "No,  because  Limantour  never  forgets  his 
enemies,  and  in  politics  one  must  sometimes  forget." 

After  having  disposed  of  his  most  dangerous  rivals, 
feeling  that  wholesale  executions  could  not  be  the  order 
of  the  day,  he  commenced  using  all  the  rogues  and  some 
of  his  enemies  for  his  own  ends,  just  as  deadly  poisons 
sometimes  are  employed  for  medicinal  purposes. 

He  was  blest  with  a  great  common  sense  which 
became  distorted  by  the  lens  of  personal  ambition.  If 
selfish  ambition  warped  his  native  common  sense,  fear 
made  him  commit  all  the  blunders  of  his  political  career. 
Like  all  people  quick  to  anger,  he  is  not  really  fearless, 
for  as  the  jungle  song  says:"  Anger  is  the  egg  of  fear." 
Fearful  and  therefore  ever  vigilant,  he  was  saved  from 
destruction  by  this  alertness,  as  the  hare  is  preserved 
from  capture  by  his  long  ears. 

He  mistook  cruelty  for  strength  of  character  and 
consequently  was  ever  ready  to  terrorize  for  fear  of 
being  thought  weak.  As  a  result  of  the  outrageous 
nickel  law  and  the  payment  of  the  famous  English  debt 
in  the  period  of  Gonzalez,  there  happened  a  mutiny. 
"Knife  them  all"  suggested  Porfirio  Diaz  to  Gonzalez. 
But  Gonzalez  was  not  afraid. 

124 


Ambition  and  fear  are  the  two  passions  which  have 
ruled  Porfirio  Diaz  in  his  life-long  political  career.  An 
ambition,  gigantic,  ultra  egotistic,  venal,  monopolizing 
and  personal;  a  fear,  the  result  of  this  selfish  ambition, 
of  a  sneakish,  pussillanimous  and  cowardly  nature. 
Last  year  on  the  i6th  of  September,  as  the  Mexican 
students  desired  to  parade  the  streets  of  the  capital, 
they  sent  their  representative,  a  Mr.  Olea,  to  beg  the 
President's  permission.  Porfirio  Diaz  answered: 
"Yes,  but  beware,  for  the  Mexicans  have  revolutionary 
tendencies  lurking  in  their  blood".  Think  of  three  scores 
of  youngsters  parading  unarmed,  being  a  menace  to 
the  republic,  with  5000  soldiers,  rurales  and  policemen 
in  the  capital. 

It  is  only  by  admitting  this  shameful  well  hidden 
stigma  on  the  apparently  brave  front  of  this  man,  that 
we  can  logically  explain  such  despicable  and  infamous 
acts,  as  the  massacre  of  Vera-Cruz  and  the  carnage  of 
Orizaba.  He  was  then,  panic  stricken,  like  a  wanderer, 
who  shoots  wildly  at  the  fleeting  phantoms  in  the  night ; 
he  was  so  terrorized  that  the  only  means  of  relieving 
his  blue  funk,  was  to  terrorize  in  return. 

Another  characteristic  of  this  wooden  half  breed, 
painted  to  look  like  iron,  is  his  facility  to  shed  tears,  I 
had  the  opportunity  to  see  him,  tears  rolling  down  his 
cheeks  at  the  recital  of  a  romantic  poem  by  a  pretty  girl 
at  a  public  function. 

By  his  enemies  he  is  nicknamed  "El  lloron  de  Ica- 
mole",  the  weeper  of  Icamole.  He  lost  the  battle  of  May 
2oth,  1 876  against  General  C.  Fuero  and  as  this  engage- 
ment was  supposed  to  decide  his  political  fate,  in  his 
keen  disappointment  and  rage  he  furnished  the  disgrace- 
ful exhibition  of  a  general  weeping  over  a  lost  battle. 

When  visitors,  friends  as  well  as  strangers,  gush 
over  his  military  exploits,  his  statesmanship,  patriotism 
and  his  generosity,  then  he  thaws  out  and  tears  surge  to 
his  eyes  and  run  over  as  a  frozen  pond  melts  and  over- 
flows in  springtime. 

When  Captain  Clodomero  Cota  was  sentenced  by 

125 


the  military  tribunal  to  be  shot,  his  father  sought  the 
president,  and  on  his  knees,  weeping,  begged  him  to  par- 
don his  son.  Porfirio  Diaz  also  was  weeping,  but  lifting  the 
despairing  man ,  uttered  this  ambiguous  phrase ;  * '  Have 
courage  and  faith  in  justice."  The  father  left  consoled, 
believing  his  petition  had  been  answered.  But  on  the 
following  morning  his  son  was  shot.  The  tears  of  Por- 
firio Diaz  are  crocodile  tears. 

What  is  even  stranger  in  the  make  up  of  this  moral 
and  intellectual  chameleon  is  his  sense  of  humor,  which 
according  to  the  stories  in  circulation  is  very  keen  and 
to  the  point. 

When  General  Escobedo  was  imprisoned,  his  friend 
complained  to  the  President  about  the  want  of  deference 
toward  this  political  victim,  who  was  the  most  talented 
military  man  during  the  war  of  Intervention  and  of  the 
Empire  and  an  honor  and  a  glory  to  his  country.  "  Yes" 
mused  the  President  "  I  agree  with  you  and  my  great- 
est wish  is  to  see  him  in  the  Hall  of  Fame."  Knowing 
the  fate  of  the  other  ambitious  generals  one  can  apprec- 
iate this  weird  jest  all  the  better. 

The  president's  son-in-law  came  late  to  limch 
several  times  at  the  castle  of  Chapultepec.  The  third 
time  when  he  was  still  accusing  his  automobile  of  being 
responsible  for  his  lateness,  the  president  said :  "  Don't 
you  know  that  the  automobile  requires  gasoline  and 
not  alcohol  to  run  it  properly."  Mrs.  A  Tweedy  once 
asked  the  President  how  he  conceived  the  first  inspira- 
tion to  become  president.  Porfirio  Diaz,  innocent  like, 
answered  "  I  never  did — I  just  drifted  into  the  position 
I  now  hold,  and  I  often  wonder  how  it  ever  came  about." 
This  is  a  classic  piece  of  humor  and  qualifies  Porfirio 
Diaz  as  candidate  for  the  presidency  of  the  Ananias 
Club. 

It  is  highly  entertaining  to  see  this  unscrupulous 
despot  who  "did  all  that  in  him  lay,  to  live  and  strive 
without  moral  principle"  sermonizing  prominent  men 
so  as  to  bring  them  down  a  peg  or  two  when  they  get 
too  bumptious  or  conceited. 

126 


As  a  Latm-American  politician  Porfirio  Diaz  has 
esti?.blished  a  standard  and  created  a  school.  The 
larger  and  more  enlightened  republics,  Brazil,  Chile 
and  Argentina  do  not  copy  his  methods,  their 
government  being  an  oligarchy  tempered  by  dem- 
ocracy ;  but  the  heads  of  the  smaller  and  more  backward 
states,  Cabrera  in  Guatemala,  Zelaya  in  Nicaragua, 
Castro  in  Venezuela  and  Reyes  in  Colombia  are  his 
slavish  imitators.  The  last  mentioned,  Reyes  even 
thought  it  worth  while  to  spend  a  year  visiting  Diaz  to 
get  his  methods  at  first  hand. 

Let  us  make  a  hurried  survey  of  Porfirio  Diaz's 
work  as  a  statesman.  In  the  beginning  of  his  power  he 
prepared  for  the  recognition  of  his  unconstitutional 
tenure  of  office  by  acknowledging  the  English,  French 
and  American  claims  or  debts;  this  was  certainly  a 
master  stroke,  for  it  enabled  him  to  make  more  loans, 
in  the  fashion  of  the  man  who  pays  his  $5  debt  to  be 
able  later  to  borrow  $20.  He  divined  or  followed  the 
axiom  of  Baron  Louis :  "A  state  desiring  credit,  must 
pay  everything,  even  its  blunders." 

His  next  move  was  the  cultivation  of  amicable  re- 
lations with  the  United  States.  This  policy  not  only 
strengthened  him  abroad  but  also  rendered  impossible 
the  revolutions  at  the  border.  To  continue  untram- 
melled as  the  Lord  and  Master  at  home  he  played  an 
intricate  game  of  political  chess,  even  cheating  when  the 
opponent  was  not  watching,  till  in  the  end  there  were 
left  on  the  board — a  king,  a  queen  and  a  few  pawns. 

His  ambition  and  the  elimination  of  all  his  rivals 
concentrated  all  their  power  in  his  hands.  As  Bulnes 
says  somewhere  that  a  chaste  and  pure  girl  left  alone 
in  a  room  with  ten  satyrs  would  be  perfectly  safe,  since 
these  would  be  busy  with  fighting  among  themselves 
but  the  danger  would  come  were  she  left  alone  with  one 
satyr.  So  Mexico  can  be  compared  to  a  beautiful  girl 
who  remained  pure  and  free  as  long  as  several  political 
satyrs  fought  among  themselves  for  possession  of  her, 
but  when  Diaz  came  along  and  destroyed  one  by  one, 

127 


in  succession,  all  his  ambitions  and  lustful  rivals,  the 
nation  then  lost  her  purity  and  freedom  and  became 
his  slave  and  prostitute. 

In  other  words  Porfirio  Diaz  has  done  his  enslaving, 
corrupting,  unpatriotic  work  so  thoroughly  that  Mr. 
Iglesias  Calderon  voiced  the  sentiment  of  many  a 
Mexican  patriot  when  he  said :"  Without  liberties  we 
run  a  more  shameful  danger  than  the  dismemberment 
of  our  country  by  force  of  arms,  namely  the  treacherous 
division  of  it  by  those  who  will  barter  the  love  of  coun- 
try for  the  love  of  liberty,"  and  as  Don  Nicamor  Bolet 
Peraza  says:  "The  great  danger  for  the  Hispano- Amer- 
ican countries  does  not  consist  in  the  colossal  military 
power  of  the  United  States,  but  in  its  admirable  liber il 
political  system  which  makes  the  conditions  of  an  Amer- 
can  citizen  so  enviable  to  us."  (i) 

The  political  mistakes  of  Porfirio  Diaz  include  his 
indifference  to  the  question  of  immigration,  as  by  this 
time  an  influx  from  Europe  would  have  been  a  great 
check  against  American  Pacific  conquest  and  Yankee 
aggression.  His  impotence  to  take  this  great  Latin- 
American  problem  by  the  horns  is  proved  by  the  small 
number  of  Europeans  in  Mexico,  and  the  compara- 
tively large  number  (about  65000)  of  Americans  now 
living  there.  For  "the  question  of  immigration  for 
Mexico  as  well  as  for  Chile,  Brazil  and  Argentina  is  a 
question  of  life  and  death ;  to  forget  it  is  sooner  or  later 
to  invite  destruction."  (2) 

His  lack  of  patriotism  is  also  shown  in  his  utter 
indifference  to  the  educational  question.  The  percen- 
tage of  illiteracy  in  Mexico  reaches  the  astonishing 
number  of  84%. 

Another  great  blunder  was  the  failure  of  Porfirio 
Diaz  to  cut  the  Gordian  knot  of  Central  American  poli- 
tics. 

The  lucky  circumstance  that  the  progress  of  Mexico 
went  hand  in  hand  with  the  increasing  fame  of  Porfirio 


(1)  Recti ficaciones  historicas   F.  Iglesias  Calderon  Pag.  75  Vol.  1. 

(2)  F.  Bulnes.  El  future  de  las  naciones  Hispano  Americanas. 

12g 


Diaz  induced  the  superficial  student  of  Mexican  politics 
into  the  belief  that  the  president  was  solely  responsible 
for  all  the  benefits  accruing  from  this  wonderful  pros- 
perity. But  Diaz  and  the  clique  which  reflects  his 
ideals,  are  short  sighted,  puny,  self -sufficient,  petty  and 
local  politicians,  without  any  patriotic  ideals;  they  are 
only  big  frogs  in  a  little  pond. 

The  Central  American  question  which  should  have 
been  solved  ten  years  ago,  remained  in  the  air,  not  be- 
cause General  Diaz  wanted  peace  in  Mexico  but  because 
he  was  afraid  and  was  too  old  to  fight.  Ten  years  ago 
he  was  68  years  old  and  therefore  physically  incapaci- 
tated to  successfully  lead  a  campaign  against  Guatemala; 
if  he  had  sent  another  general  to  head  the  expedition, 
in  case  of  a  victory  Porfirio  Diaz  would  have  lost  his 
prestige  and  power. 

Porfirio  Diaz  is  not  a  military  man  in  any  sense 
ofjthe  word.  He  is  more  of  a  political  affinity,  a  HUipu- 
tian  imitation  of  Cardinal  Richelieu,  ruling  an  impassive 
king,  which  in  his  case  is  the  Mexican  nation.  He  has 
all  the  sinuous,  treacherous,  underhand  methods  of  the 
militant  prelates  of  the  12th  century. 

The  account  of  his  campaigns  do  not  prove  him  to 
be  either  a  great  strategist  or  a  great  tactician.  He  was 
only  a  "beau  sabreur",  with  as  much  strategical  ability 
as  was  required  by  a  robber  chief  and  his  band  to  attack 
and  destroy  a  heavily  armed  and  protected  conyoy. 

His  fame  as  a  general  is  another  snowball  which 
was  rolled  down  the  moimtain  of  Mexican  miHtary  ex- 
ploits by  his  ofiicial  flatterers;  it  became  a  formidable 
avalanche  which  at  the  bottom  of  the  valley,  imder  the 
searching  rays  of  history  will  melt  into  a  shallow,  dirty 
puddle. 

According  to  his  official  admirers  he  has  won  41 
battles,  actions  or  engagements,  he  possesses  moreover 
14  government  decorations  and  13  foreign  decorations, 
among  which  is  the  first  class  order  of  the  Liberator 
from  Venezuela. 

The  longer  he  stays  in  power,  the  more  battles  he 

129 


seems  to  be  winning;  they  increase  with  amazing  rapid- 
ity. I  can  imagine  the  faithful  and  useful  millionaire 
valet,  Colonel  Pablo  Escandon,  stepping  into  the  sanc- 
tum of  the  chief,  hand  to  forehead,  heels  joined  together 
in  military  fashion,  reporting :  "  General,  I  beg  to  inform 
you  that  you  have  won  another  battle "  *  *  Which  one  ? " 
says  General  Diaz,  And  then  the  glad  tidings  are 
bruited  abroad  and  jotted  down  on  the  official  roll  of 
honor. 

The  battles  of  the  5th  of  May,  1862  and  of  the  2nd 
of  April,  1867  which  are  officially  celebrated  as  great 
victories  of  Porfirio  Diaz,  were  never  won  by  him.  The 
battle  of  the  5th  of  May  was  won  by  General  Zaragoza, 
and  the  action  of  the  2nd  of  April  was  forced  on  the 
council  of  war  by  a  civilian,  Justo  Benitez,  his  secretary; 
the  organization  of  this  assault  was  made  by  General 
Alatorre  and  Porfirio  Diaz  came  into  action  at  the  tail 
end  of  the  engagement.  The  battle  of  Tecoac  which 
decided  the  fall  of  the  Lerdo  government  was  won  by 
the  timely  arrival  of  General  Gonzalez. 

What  is  left  then  to  this  hero  of  a  thousand  and 
one  battles?  Only  two  bloody  actions:  the  massacre 
of  Vera-Cruz  and  the  carnage  of  Orizaba,  victories, 
worthy  of  him,  which  will  be  inscribed  in  blood}^  letters 
in  his  pantheon  of  immortality. 

We  have  seen  his  work  as  a  statesman,  patriot  and 
as  general  and  we  stand  amazed  at  the  impudence  of 
this  misappropriated  and  plagarized  political  and  mili- 
tary fame,  unheard  of  in  the  annals  of  history,  and 
verily  we  can  say  with  Bulnes  that  the  only  marvellous 
things  in  Latin-America  are  the  lies. 

Porfirio  Diaz  is  old  now,  almost  80  years  old,  too 
old  to  continue  with  usefulness  and  dignity  in  the  chair 
of  state.  Although  de  facto  a  Czar  he  was  fain  to  be 
called  president,  for  the  title  of  Emperor  in  Mexico  has 
a  sort  of  hoodoo  attached  to  it.  Three  Emperors  were 
killed  in  Mexico,  Montezuma,  Iturbide  and  Maximilian. 

The  days  of  the  Czar  of  Mexico  are  numbered ;  he  is 
slipping  fast  into  decrepitude,  physical  and  mental. 

130 


He  is  like  the  wolf  who  became  the  head  of^the^'pack 
and  kept  his  supremacy  by  the  strength  of  his  teeth; 
the  day  the  other  wolves  discover  that  their  chief  has  be- 
come toothless  they  tear  him  to  pieces.  And  so  it 
might  happen  with  Porfirio  Diaz. 

Now  he  is  only  a  stuffed  lion,  a  giant  with  clay  feet, 
and  he  could  be  pushed  over  with  the  little  finger  into 
the  ash-heap.  And  when  he  dies — God  bless  his  soul 
— with  him  will  die  the  last  political  bandit  in  Mexico. 


131 


We  knowjwhatjwe  are,  but  know  not  what  we  may 

be. 

Hamlet,  Act  IX,  Scenb  V. 


The   Central   American   Question. 

American  influence  in  the  isthmus  of  Panama  has 
modified  the  whole  status  of  Central  American  politics. 
It  has  cast  over  the  entire  strip  from  the  Rio  Grande  to 
the  Chagres  River  the  shadow  of  the  American  eagle. 
Events  which  formerly  passed  unnoticed,  are  now 
scrutinized  with  attention  and  an  eye  to  their  bearing  on 
the  future. 

The  whole  situation  of  Central  America  is  resting 
on  a  flimsy  basis,  like  an  argument  with  a  false  premise. 
The  five  Central  American  republics  have  no  more  busi- 
ness to  be  independent  of  one  another  than  the  27  states 
of  Mexico  and  the  46  states  in  the  American  union 
would  have. 

In  1 82 1  all  the  five  ancient  provinces  of  Spain 
formed  the  Mexican  federation  which  persisted  up  to 
the  fall  of  Iturbide  (nth  of  May,  1823)  which  then 
again  separated  w4th  the  exception  of  Chiapas  which 
remained  with  Mexico.  Ever  since,  Guatemala,  Salva- 
dor, Honduras  and  Nicaragua  have  always  been  war- 
ring against  one  another  or  getting  up  internal  revolu- 
tions ;  and  for  a  space  of  ninety  years  there  has  not  been 
one  year  of  peace  in  the  Central  American  isthmus, 
except  in  Costa  Rica  which  is  rightly  called  the  Switzer- 
land of  America.  From  1821  till  1885  the  struggle 
centered  aroimd  Salvador,  Honduras  and  Nicaragua 
against  Guatemala,  which  aspired  to,  and  achieved 
the  material  and  moral  sovereignty  over  the  rest.  But 
in  1885  at  the  death  of  her  President,  Rufino  Barrios,  at 
the  battle  of  Chalchuapa,  Guatemala  lost  her  suprem- 
acy, although  she  still  exerts  an  isolated  influence 
alternatively  over  Salvador  and  Honduras.  Nicaragua 
on  that  date,  not  only  recovered  her  moral  indepen- 
dence, but  began  aspiring  to  be  the  pivot  of  a  move- 
ment favoring  a  federal  union  of  the  five  states. 

135 


As  a  matter  of  fact  a  Central  American  federation 
is  an  impossibility,  owing  to  the  difficulty  of  creating  a 
purely  federal  army,  because  of  the  intense  rivalry 
among  the  respective  governments  which  unfits  them 
for  an  "  entente  cordiale",  and  because  it  is  a  conflict  of 
personalities  and  a  competition  between  unscrupulous 
grafters. 

The  whole  political  situation  of  the  last  ten  years 
has  been  reduced  to  a  personal  struggle  between  the 
President  of  Guatemala,  Cabrera,  and  the  President  of 
Nicaragua,  Zelaya.  They  have  both  protected  all  sorts 
of  revolutionary  schemes  by  the  rebel  exiles  from  the 
other  republics. 

Zelaya,  a  doctor  in  medicine,  educated  in  Paris,  is 
energetic  and  intelligent ;  Cabrera  a  lawyer,  is  not  infer- 
ior to  him  either  in  talent  or  will  power;  moreover  the 
latter's  cunning  and  boldness  are  recognized  even  by 
his  enemies.  It  will  easily  be  seen  that  such  men  are 
not  anxious  to  merge  their  supreme  power  into  an  ideal 
federation,  since  that  would  mean  the  loss  of  exclusive 
monopolies  and  schemes  for  personal  enrichment. 

During  the  twelve  years  that  Cabrera  has  been  in 
power  he  has  amassed  a  forttme  of  many  millions  of 
dollars,  thanks  to  the  business  enterprise  of  his  partner, 
a  German-American  Jew  who  gets  a  rakeoff  on  every 
bag  of  coffee  that  leaves  the  coimtry  and  who  tried 
to  hold  up  the  Pan-American  railroad  for  $1,500,000 
gold  for  the  concession  that  the  other  states  had 
granted  freely.  Nor  are  all  these  ill-gotten  gains  in- 
vested in  the  states  from  which  they  have  been  drained ; 
Cabrera  owns  a  fine  hotel  in  Hamburg;  Zelaya  sends 
his  wife  abroad  every  year,  ostensibly  to  get  new  clothes 
in  Paris,  but  in  reality  with  a  bag  of  gold  to  place  in 
European  banks.  Verily  to  be  President  in  Central 
America  is  to  be  a  cross  between  a  bandit  and  the  exe- 
cutive of  a  huge  department  store. 

The  struggle  would  have  been  endless  without  the 
intervention  of  the  United  States  and  Mexico  It  al- 
ways begins  with  the  romantic  formula  "  right  is  might" 

136 


and  will  end  by  armed  intervention.  The  United 
States  cannot  but  favor  the  absorbtion  of  Central  Amer- 
ica by  Mexico,  and  this  would  have  come  about  ten 
years  ago  but  for  the  poUcy  of  Porfirio  Diaz  which  has 
always  been  inert,  cowardly  and  procrastinating. 

In  1898  when  there  was  danger  of  war  between 
Guatemala  and  Mexico,  the  state  of  Jalisco  offered, 
single-handed,  with  her  own  resources  and  men  to 
fight  the  former,  and  had  the  offer  been  accepted, 
Jalisco  would  have  succeeded,  as  it  is  the  richest  and 
most  populous  of  the  Mexican  states. 

Since  Guatemala's  geographical  position  makes  her 
the  key  to  the  isthmus  her  annexation  to  Mexico  will 
end  the  chaotic  state  of  affairs  in  Central  America,  for 
then  Mexico  will  control  Honduras  and  Salvador  and 
therefore  also  Nicaragua, 

Two  Spanish  journalists  Segarra  and  Julia,  who 
made  a  trip  from  the  Panama  canal  to  the  city  of  Mexi- 
co, reported  their  experiences  in  lectures,  newspaper 
articles  and  books.  They  are  agreed  upon  the  fact  that 
railroad  commtmications  will  help  toward  peace  more 
effectually  than  alHances  or  peace  conferences.  The  great 
work  of  pacification  is  being  achieved  by  the  Pan- 
American  railroad,  a  great  deal  of  the  success  of  which  is 
due  to  the  efforts  and  diplomacy  of  its  vice-president 
Mr.  Neelan. 

Annexation  which  is  the  paramount  issue  will  be 
taken  up  again  after  the  death  of  Porfirio  Diaz  and  the 
Mexican  president  or  general  who  will  solve  it  satisfac- 
torily, will  not  only  be  the  most  popular  man  in  his 
country  but  will  also  make  history  in  Central  America. 


137 


The  Last  Mexican  Massacre. 

Velardena  Affair  Proved  To  Be  Wanton  Slaugh- 
ter By  Officers  Of  Diaz* 

New  light  upon  the  killing  of  unarmed  and  unres- 
isting Mexican  citizens  in  the  little  town  of  Velardena, 
not  far  from  the  city  of  Torreon,  has  at  last  aroused  all 
Mexico,  and,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  native  press  is 
in  deadly  fear  of  telling  the  whole  stor>%  much  truth  has 
leaked  out  showing  that  Diaz  is  as  bloodthirsty  in  his 
method  of  rule  as  was  the  last  Sultan  of  Turkey. 

The  people  of  Velardena  were  holding  a  fiesta  and 
marching  in  procession  when  the  local  police  attempted 
to  disperse  them.  Not  succeeding  in  completely  cow- 
ing the  populace,  the  troops  were  sent  for,  with  the  fol- 
lowing result,  as  described  in  the  "Mexican  Herald"  of 
June  13,  1909: 

"When  the  forces  sent  from  Durango,  comprising 
seventy  men  of  the  Second  Platoon,  arrived  at  Velar- 
dena, imder  command  of  Captain  J.  M.  T.,  and  of  the 
state  gendarmes  under  the  command  of  Commandante 
O.  M.,  all  under  the  command  of  Lieutenant  Colonel  G. 
G.,  the  town  was  pacified.  A  detachment  of  rurales 
had  already  arrived  from  Lerdo,  commanded  by  Cor- 
poral A.  C,  and  the  Cuencueme  forces  at  the  command 
of  Chief  of  Police  L.  E. 

"In  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  tumult  was  all  over, 
G.  G,  according  to  an  important  witness,  was  not  satis- 
fied in  taking  mere  precautionary  measures,  but  made 
the  statement  that  he  had  not  made  the  trip  as  a 
wild  goose  chase  and  that  it  would  never  do  to  re- 
turn to  Durango  without  shooting  somebody.  So  he 
commanded  that  he  be  shown  a  list  of  the  principal  dis- 
turbers. From  this  list  he  selected  Alejandro  Murguia, 
Antonio  Reyes,  Nabor  Rocha,  Felipe  Flores,  Doroteo 

♦This  Chapter  was  added  in  July,  1909  after  a  careful  revision  of  this  book. 

138 


Hernandez,  Isabel  Arellano,  Francisco  Avitia,  Jose 
Nava,  Bonificio  Gonzales,  Aurelio  Cruz,  Simon  Lopez, 
Alberto  Perales,  Sebastian  Morales,  Agapito  Contreras, 
and  Pedro  Madero,  and  commanded  that  they  be  shot 
as  traitors,  from  the  back. 

"The  first  four  were  executed  by  the  state  gend- 
armes commanded  by  Commandante  M.  and  the  re- 
mainder were  shot  by  a  squad  at  the  command  of  Chief 
of  PoHce  E. 

"The  executions  were  most  horribly  bloody.  With 
their  arms  tied  behind  them,  they  were  shot  in  the  most 
cruel  manner,  and  some  of  them  were  thrown  into 
ditches  dug  for  their  interment  and  buried  alive.  The 
bloody  instinct  of  E.  showed  itself  in  its  most  re- 
volting form  when  he  shot  one  poor  fellow  at  less  than 
an  arm's  length,  and  while  the  miserable  victim  groan- 
ed in  agony  threw  him  into  the  ditch  by  his  feet. 

"Captain  Jose  Maria  Tello  refused  to  obey  the  or- 
ders of  Colonel  G.  unless  they  were  written.  G.  refused 
to  write  the  order  and  insisted  on  Tello  canning  it 
out.  At  that  point  Tello  energetically  refused,  saying 
he  would  be  shot  himself  before  he  would  carry'  out 
the  order. 

"An  important  witness  was  Corporal  Antonio  Ca- 
villo.  He  said  that  when  he  arrived  ever\^thing  was 
quiet.  Nevertheless  Colonel  G.  G.  said  that  it  would 
be  impossible  to  return  without  doing  something.  Fol- 
lowing this  idea  he  had  Commandante  M.  take  a  list  of 
the  names  of  all  the  disturbers,  and  taking  the  list, 
marked  at  random  the  names  of  those  to  be  shot,  with  a 
red  pencil. 

"Before  the  execution  M.  went  in  search  of  grave 
diggers  to  prepare  the  ditches  in  which  to  throw  the 
victims." 


139 


The  Financial  System. 

The  "Cientificos"  -A  financial  camarilla. 

Cast  in  thy  lot  among  us;  let  us  all  have  one  purse. 

Proverbs. 

The  financial  system  of  a  nation  is  logically  an  off- 
shoot of  the  political  game;  it  is  the  top  of  the  pyramid, 
which  cannot  exist  without  the  basis.  If  the  government 
be  personal  the  financial  department  cannot  be  any- 
thing but  personal.  Although  Gaudin  said  that  the  fi- 
nances of  a  nation  were  governed  by  the  same  princi- 
ples as  those  of  private  individuals,  there  comes  a  time 
when  a  finance  minister  who  has  been  too  long  in  power 
unconsciousl}^  feels  that  the  national  treasury  is  almost 
his  private  property  and  he  finances  accordingly. 

For  the  last  two  decades  we  have  heard  nothing 
but  praise  about  the  finance  minister  of  Mexico,  and 
of  course  he  has  been  called  the  greatest  finance  minis- 
ter in  the  world.  For  the  last  sixteen  years  he  has  dic- 
tated the  financial  policy  of  Mexico  without  interference 
from  a  slavish  Congress  or  even  a  board  of  directors,  but 
has  only  been  responsible  to  Porfirio  Diaz,  who,  without 
fear  of  contradiction,  has  been  as  great  a  financial  genius 
as  Abdul  Hamid. 

The  President  is  always  busy  playing  his  little 
political  game  but  always  with  one  eye  to  the  treas- 
ury, knowing  or  divining  instinctively  that  only  a  full 
treasury  can  pay  for  a  well  equipped  army,  efficient 
police  force  and  12,000  rurales  which  keep  him  in  power 
at  the  polls  with  the  help  of  the  glitter  of  bayonets. 

That  the  credit  of  Mexico  has  risen  in  an  extraor- 
dinary manner  is  an  undeniable  fact  and  it  can  be  said 
truthfully  that  for  the  first  time  that  country  has 
achieved  real  credit  in  the  nation  as  well  as  abroad. 

The  settlement  of  the  public  debt  imposed  itself 

140 


on  Mexico  as  an  imperative  necessity,  as  otherwise  it 
would  have  been  impossible  to  create  a  treasury  and 
assure  the  credit  of  the  nation.  President  Jaurez  tried 
to  bring  about  a  settlement  of  the  debt  in  1870,  but  his 
project  was  refused  by  the  bond  holders  of  the  English 
debt.  President  Lerdo  likewise  tried  it,  but  without  suc- 
cess. In  1880  Porfirio  Diaz  had  succededin  getting  up 
another  project  which  was  pigeon-holed  on  account  of 
the  accession  to  power  of  President  Gonzalez.  The  lat- 
ter also  attempted  the  settlement  of  this  famous  debt, 
but  it  did  not  come  to  a  head  until  June  23d,  i886, 
when  General  Mena  in  cunjunqtion  with  the  English 
bond-holders  agreed  to  a  settlement  of  the  debt. 

The  credit  of  Mexico  not  only  started  from  that 
date  but  it  was  the  beginning  of  a  series  of  loans  which 
increased  in  arithmetical  progression.  The  result  was 
that  the  appetites  increased  with  the  large  profits.  The 
salaried  press  tried  to  prove  that  the  larger  the  debt  of 
a  nation  the  greater  its  credit  and  welfare;  that  these 
debts  were  a  guarantee  of  peace,  for  then  the  nations 
who  were  the  creditors  would  be  interested  that  peace 
should  continue  and  that  the  country  should  be  devel- 
oped. Like  Ouvrard,  Porfirio  Diaz  and  J.  Y.  Limantour 
imagined  "credit  as  multiplying  wealth.  Enthusiastic 
about  the  instrument  without  understanding  its  orig- 
inal function,  they  believed  credit  to  be  a  means  of 
creating  riches,  without  realizing  that  work  only  is  pro- 
ductive and  that  credit  is  only  a  tool  of  transmission 
which  helps  in  the  formation  of  wealth,  credit  being  in- 
capacitated in  itself  to  originate  it."  (i) 

The  government  tried  to  prove  that  all  the  money 
invested  in  public  improvements  reverted  to  the  nation- 
al treasury  in  geometrical  progression,  and  that  in  this 
simple  manner  the  debt  would  pay  itself  off  without  in- 
creasing the  taxes.  So  much  was  said  and  repeated  by 
the  authorities  in  Mexico,  in  Europe  and  in  the  United 
States  that  the  Mexican  government  and,  especially,  the 
minister  of  finance  ended  by  convincing  themselves 

(1)  Portraits  of  financiers.     A.  Liesse 

141 


that  they  were  cleverer  and  keener  than  the  most  talent- 
ed bankers  and  financial  men  in  the  world.  If  an  idiot 
were  to  tell  you  the  same  story  ever\^  day  for  a  year,  you 
would  end  by  believing  him. 

On  December  13,  1887,  Congress  gave  submissively 
the  authorization  for  a  loan  of  ^10,500,000.  On  the  4th 
of  May,  1 890,the  Executive  was  empowered  to  consolidate 
and  exchange  the  subventions  accredited  to  some  rail- 
road enterprises.  In  virtue  of  this  the  government  dealt 
in  a  two -fold  manner :  first  with  the  companies  who  were 
creditors,  and  secondly  with  the  representatives  of  the 
different  banking  houses  which  had  presented  proposi- 
tions to  the  President.  The  government  decided  in  fa- 
vor of  Baron  Bleichroeder  with  a  loan  of  ;^6,ooo,ooo. 
The  price  of  sale  was  88f  %  and  the  interest  was  fixed 
at  6%. 

In  May, 1 893,  the  Executive  asked  for  authorization 
to  finish  the  settlement  of  the  debt  by  means  of  oper- 
ations convenient  for  this  purpose.  Limantour  was 
then  minister  of  finance. 

In  1893-94  riew  loans  were  contracted  which  had  as 
their  object  the  settlement  of  the  aforementioned  debt. 
They  contained  certain  clauses  which  permitted  the 
emission  of  titles  or  bonds  for  ^2,500,000  for  the  pur- 
pose of  settling  and  consolidating  the  floating  debt  con- 
tracted on  account  of  the  failure  of  the  crops  for  two 
consecutive  years,  as  well  as  the  lowering  of  the  price 
of  silver.  The  sum  was  increased  to  ^3,000,000  so  that 
the  Executive  could  dedicate  a  part  of  the  new  bonds  to 
rescind  the  contracts  with  the  mint  and  to  conclude  the 
national  railroad  of  Tehuantepec.  With  the  aforemen- 
tioned authorization  the  emission  of  a  loan  of  ,^3,000,- 
000  at  6%  payable  every  three  months,  was  contracted 
with  for  Bleichroeder  and  the  Banco  National  of  Mex- 
ico. In  1 898  another  loan  was  called  for  with  bonds  at 
5  % ;  this  loan  was  guaranteed  by  the  turning  over  of  62  % 
of  the  Custom  House  receipts.  In  1904  another  loan 
was  contracted  of  $40,000,000  at  4%,  nominally  as 
bonds,  which  were  sold   at   95%,  interest  to  be  paid 

142 


on  it  at  4  •49%-  Finally  in  1908  another  loan  was  called 
for  $50,000,000  for  the  sake  of  encouraging  irrigation 
and  immigration. (?) 

From  all  this,  it  results  that  the  actual  debt  of 
Mexico  amounts  to  over  $400,000,000.  It  is  an  inheri- 
tance which  will  be  left  to  the  nation  by  the  paternal 
government  of  President  Diaz  and  is  the  least  of  the 
evils  which  he  shall  have  to  account  for  when  God  shall 
recall  him. 

And,  nota  bene,  all  this  has  been  done,  not  in  times 
of  financial  difficulties  for  the  country,  but  while  the  in- 
come of  the  nation  was  increasing  year  by  year. 

Year  Income                              Expenses 

1885-86  $27,810,909.. $38,903,353- 

1886-87  $31,168,352 - $31,536,205. 

1887-88  $33,932,226 ^ $36,270,451. 

1888-89  $34,334,783.-- $38,572,239 

1889-90  $38,486,601... ....$36,765,906. 

1890-91  $37,391,804 $38,439,488. 

1891-92  $37,474,879 $38,377,364- 

1892-93  $37,692,293 -.$40,367,047. 

1893-94  $40,211,747 — $44,634,739- 

1894-95  $43,943,699 $45,610,279. 

In  the  fiscal  year  1 895-96  the  revenue  of  the  nation 
increased  to  $50,521,470.  In  1902-03  they  were  $76,- 
000,000;  in  1907-08,  $114,286,122.  In  1 895-96  the  first 
surplus  amounted  to  $1,113,046,  increasing  with  the 
years.  On  June  30,  1903,  the  reserve  funds  formed  by 
these  surpluses  exceeded  $30,000,000. 

Last  year,  the  first  year  of  the  panic,  they  admitted 
a  deficit  of  20  million  dollars ;  this  year  it  will  be  40  mil- 
lions. 

The  principal  resources  of  the  government  are  their 
revenue  established  by  an  almost  prohibitory  tariff  and 
the  product  of  the  burdensome  stamps  revenue  from 
which  is  derived  one-third  of  the  income  and  which 
gravitates  principally  upon  foreign  capital,  so  that  the 
day  this  foreign  capital  does  not  invest  into  Mexico  there 

143 


will  be  an  enormous  financial  unbalance,  a  famine 
will  follow  and  a  panic  such  as  no  other  country  has 
ever  had.  Then  the  wiseacres  who  now  praise  the  gen- 
ius of  the  minister  of  finance  will  be  convinced  that  his 
system  is  archaic,  primitive,  dangerous  and  deceitful. 

In  the  last  25  years  the  rents  of  the  houses  have  in- 
creased 200%.  Rice  has  increased  its  price  200%,  sugar 
beans,  com  and  all  the  staples  have  gone  up  from  125 
to  250%.  At  the  same  time  the  salaries  are  about  the 
same  as  they  were  25  years  ago. 

W^hat  is  the  financial  genius  of  Mexico  going  to  do 
with  an  increasing  deficit?  Cover  it  up  with  more  loans? 
The  situation  in  Mexico  is  similar  to  that  of  the  man  who 
has  turned  over  the  management  of  his  house  to  an 
expert,  who  under  the  pretext  of  improvements  has 
borrowed  money  on  the  value  of  the  house  so  that  by  the 
time  the  owner  wants  to  get  into  possession  of  his  pro- 
perty he  finds  that  it  does  not  belong  to  him  any  more 
but  to  the  owners  of  the  mortgages.  Likewise,  Mexico 
has  been  mortgaged  to  the  foreign  bankers  who  at  the 
death  of  Porfirio  Diaz  will  own  everything  that  is  worth 
having. 

If  the  President  could  live  another  fifty  years  he 
might  possibly  crawl  out  of  the  present  financial  crisis, 
but  as  this  is  out  of  the  question,  he  entertains  the  idea 
of  a  continuation  of  his  system  by  men  of  his  own  cre- 
ation who,  having  enriched  themselves  under  his  rule, 
would  keep  a  tight  Ud  on  all  the  unsavory  deals  of  the 
past  25  years. 

The  "cientificos,"  led  by  the  minister  of  finance, 
have  trailed  the  President  in  his  financial  raids  like  a 
pack  of  "coyotes"  in  the  wake  of  a  wolf  out  hunting. 
There  is  no  business  transaction  of  any  magnitude,  no 
organization  of  any  bank  or  trust  company,  nor  the  sell- 
ing of  a  mining  or  any  concession  of  any  importance  in 
which  these  scientific  grafters  have  not  had  a  share,  nor 
is  there  a  profitable  business  which  they  do  not  turn  in- 
to a  monopoly.  The  manufacture  of  paper  was  turned 
by  them  into  a  monopoly  so  that  they  might  keep  their 

144 


power  as  a  sword  of  Damocles  over  the  helpless  news- 
paper editors.  Once  upon  a  time  an  American  asked 
for  a  concession  to  manufacture  dynamite,  which  is  used 
extensively  in  mining.  He  also  asked  for  a  tariff  rate  of 
$200  a  ton  so  as  to  protect  his  manufacture.  But  he 
never  did  turn  out  a  single  poimd  of  dynamite  but  im- 
ported it  all  at  a  cost  of  30  to  40  dollars  a  ton  which  in 
his  turn  he  sold  to  the  consumer  in  Mexico  at  the  rate 
of  $200  a  ton.  One  of  the  powerful  cientificos  was  back- 
ing the  American, 

When  the  Mexican  Meat  and  Packing  Co.  started 
building  slaughter  houses  and  sold  refrigerated  meat 
in  Mexico,  the  rival  houses  did  not  go  out  of  business  as 
was  expected. 

They  invoked  the  aid  of  a  powerful  minister  of 
finance  who  informed  the  president  of  the  meat  packing 
company  that  he  had  changed  his  mind  about  the  exemp- 
tion of  taxes  and  that  he  would  extend  part  of  this  ex- 
emption over  a  period  of  20  years  if  the  meat  packing 
company  would  buy  up  all  the  slaughter  houses  in  Mex- 
ico City.  The  president  of  the  corporation  understood 
the  hint  and  asked  for  the  price  of  sale.  He  had  care- 
fully priced  all  the  rival  slaughter  houses  and  his  fig- 
lu-e  with  a  large  margin  of  profit  was  half  a  million  dol- 
lars. Imagine  his  consternation  when  the  minister  gent- 
ly broke  the  news  to  him :  Two  milUons  and  a  half  dol- 
lars. The  mayor  of  the  city  and  some  of  the  other  cien- 
tificos were  in  the  deal. 

Every  cientifico  is  like  a  bridge  that  foreign  invest- 
ors must  cross  sooner  or  later  to  get  any  concession  of 
any  value  When  there  is  a  big  law  suit  on  hand  (the 
cientificos  being  mostly  lawyers)  one  of  them  reluctant- 
ly takes  up  the  case,  and  wins  it  in  exchange  for  a  very 
fat  check.  Any  reform  of  the  monetary  or  banking 
system  or  of  the  tariff  or  anything  connected  with  mon- 
ey matters  is  put  into  the  hands  of  a  cientifico  whose 
greed  is  "as  insatiable  as  the  eyes  of  man,  the  belly 
of  a  goat  or  the  hands  of  a  monkey." 

They  are  a  well  drilled,  clever,  unscrupulous  dis- 

145 


ciplined  and  tireless  phalanx  which  swoops  down  on 
everything  which  smells  of  money  as  mice  when  attracted 
by  the  odor  of  cheese. 

When  they  cannot  turn  out  an  honest  penny» 
they  lend  it  out  at  an  interest  which  would  make  an 
Amsterdam  money  lender  blush  in  shame.  The  mayor 
of  a  large  city  offered  to  lend  money  to  the  president  of 
a  newspaper  at  60%  a  year.  Most  of  the  banks  in  Mex- 
ico are  in  the  control  of  the  cientificos  and  they  lend 
money  at  the  rate  of  15%  and  sometimes  18%  a  year. 

But  the  end  of  all  this  grafting  is  nearing  and  many 
of  the  cientificos  and  their  associates  are  selling  their 
chattels  and  shifting  their  bank  accoimts  to  European 
banks,  following  the  lead  of  their  chief,  imitating  thus 
the  rats  who  leave  the  ship  as  soon  as  it  begins  taking 
water. 

The  people  of  Mexico  who  patiently  curbed  their 
necks  imder  the  ruthless  and  maleficient  yoke  of  the 
Czar  while  there  was  work,  food  and  good  times,  have 
finally  awakened  to  a  sense  of  consciousness  through 
the  pangs  of  himger.  For  the  first  time  in  30  years 
there  is  an  open  and  defiant  opposition  to  the  reelection 
of  the  President,  as  the  Mexicans  reaUze  that  the 
financial  camarilla  cannot  be  removed  without  the 
elimination  of  the  Czar  himself. 

There  are  already  ominous  signs  of  general  un- 
rest in  the  usually  obedient  press,  at  public  meetings, 
in  the  army  and  in  the  organization  of  anti  reelection- 
ist  clubs  all  over  the  country.  The  whole  nation  is 
seething  like  a  mighty  cauldron  and  a  deep  and  re- 
verberating rumbling  is  heard  as  before  an  earthquake. 
When  the  storm  comes  Porfirio  Diaz  and  his  camarilla 
will  meet  the  same  fate  as  that  of  Abdul  Hamid  and 
his  eimuchs.  But  they  will  not  take  notice  but  will 
go  on  madly,  greedily  unconscious  of  their  fate,  for  the 
Gods  first  make  mad  those  whom  they  wish  to  destroy. 


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UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A     000  946  173     2 


LOS  ANGElL'  '^^'^'^'"9  Lot  17     '^ClLfTY 


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